Music was the medium through which much of the liturgy was transmitted in performance. This subproject puts the music of the Old Hispanic commemoration of martyrs front and centre, exploring how it helped shape the identity of the martyr being commemorated. The music of the Old Hispanic liturgy, found in manuscripts from ca. 900 to 1085, has generally been undervalued by musicologists because it is written in unpitched notation; this makes a reproduction in modern notation impossible, thus presenting significant challenges to researchers. Melanie Shaffer uses innovative digital methods for understanding the musical language of the Old Hispanic notation, combining her analysis with approaches from art history and manuscript studies, seeking to understand how music interacts with the text of the liturgy, what elements it emphasises and what melodic patterns are shared between saints. Her research has led to a clearer picture of how the liturgy shaped the commemoration of martyrs.
This subproject is part of the main project Making a martyr in medieval Iberia, 589-1080 (P.I. Dr Kati Ihnat).
