1^'M^lVl'^/IS'

D O L O R E S PESCE

Guido d'Arezzo (b, ca, 991/2; d, after 1033) is associated with the invention of
a singing method that uses the syllables ut, re, mi, f a , 50!, and la, a method we
now call solmization,1 In our modern application of this concept, we sing a new
melody using the text syllables themselves. Is that what Guido intended? How
did a singer in Guido s time use this device? Were older methods of learning
discarded?
My purpose in this essay is to examine what Guido actually said about
solmization syllables in his Epistola ad Michahelem (Letter to Michael), to
speculate on what he left unsaid, and ultimately to shed light on what "musi-
cal understanding" meant to him. Simply put, the syllables, viewed in the
context of their self-contained six-note segment, embody all essential pitch
principles. In directing his singers to internalize the proprietas or property
of every pitch by means of this vehicle, Guido called into play both sensory
perception and intellect,
Boethius had defined a musicus as someone who understood the prin-
ciples of music and who could judge composition and performance, while a
performer was a mere practitioner,2 This distinction was carried over into
mid-ninth-century Carolingian writings, but with some ambiguity. Because
the Church needed performers of chant (i,e,, cantors), performance could no

26 * Dolores Pesce
longer be relegated to a second seat. Given his task, Guido had little use for
the speculative inquiries of the musicus, for he needed to train boys to sing
chant as efficiently as possible*3 As a result, understanding had to serve the
act of singing*
Guido wrote four treatises: the Micrologus (after IO26),4 the Regule,5 the
Prologus (a prologue to an antiphoner),6 and the Epistola (before 1033)7 He
used the Latin word sensus only twice, once in the Micrologus and once in
the Prologus. The Prologus passage is relevant for this study: "In our times, of
all men, singers are most foolish* For in every art, exceedingly more numer-
ous are the things that we learn through our sensus than those that we have
learned from a teacher" (Prologus, i-3)*8 Sensus has a range of lexical meanings,
divided roughly into the categories of corporeal and mental, with the latter
being further subdivided into moral and intellectual*9 The moral aspects do
not seem relevant to the present discussion* Appropriate translations for the
corporeal are "perception, feeling, sensation," and for the intellectual aspect
of the mental, "sense, understanding, mind, reason*" Although Guide's use
of sensus in the Prologus does not clearly indicate the roles of feeling versus
thinking, the Regule (11* 8-10) contain other relevant evidence:
Great is the gap between musicians and singers;
the latter talk about what music comprises, while the former understand
these things*
For he who does what he does not understand is termed a beast*10
So, Guido clearly derided a singer who remained the "unknowing" cantor*
He wanted a singer to be independent of a teacher and, ultimately, to be able
to sight-sing any melody* To this end he promoted, in all four of his treatises,
notational and pitch-training devices that superseded the rote learning meth-
ods on which musicians had hitherto relied*
In his Micrologus, Regule, and Epistola, Guido stated that one must learn
the pitch system of seven letters and reinforce this with an understanding of
their location on the monochord* The next step was to learn intervals* In the
earlier two treatises, Guido said that one should hammer out the intervals on
the monochord until they are impressed on the memory* He implied that if
one has learned intervals well in the abstract, retaining them in the memory,
then the sounding of a new melody at the monochord would be consciously
or unconsciously perceived as a succession of intervals rather than of isolated
pitches, thus aiding the ear* Sensory perception rather than thinking seems
Guido d'Arezzo, Ut queant laxis, and Musical Understanding • 27
Ut que - ant
pol - lu - ti ]a - bi
lo - ban - nes.
EXAMPLE 2.1. Hymn Ut queant laxis, as presented by Guido in the Epistola.
foremost in this stage of training, although Guide's wording in the Micrologus
does not rule out an intellectual component*11
Guido refined his instructional method in the Epistola when he recom-
mended that one learn the proprietas or "property" of every tone through
an associational device such as the hymn Ut queant laxis (see example 2*i)*12
Ut re mi fa sol la are the respective first syllables of the first six lines of this
hymn* For each phrase one memorizes the starting pitch's property—that
is, its quality based on the configuration of tones and semitones around it*
Then one matches a new melodic phrase to one of the hymn's phrases* In so
doing, one gets one's bearings for a given tone within a nexus of tones* Thus,
learning a new song would still require memorizing its specific succession of
intervals, but now geared to a focal point* In the earlier Micrologus, Guido
certainly understood the concept of a focal point when he explained that one
could recognize a mode by hearing the tones immediately preceding the final
(chap* n)* But it was not until the Epistola that he articulated a precise and
novel approach to teaching a pitch's "property*"
Not incidentally, Guido no longer prescribed learning the six melodic
intervals in and of themselves on the monochord* Immediately following Ut
queant laxis, he offered a didactic exercise A/me rector (see example 2*2)* It al-
lows one to practice intervals in relationship to a given tone, in a systematic
order—for example, an ascending second, third, fourth, and fifth from D, and
so forth*13 Guido apparently intended this more abstract, systematic exercise
to complement the associative learning of a tone's property as offered by Ut
queant laxis.
The other component of Guido's approach that solidified between the
writing of the Micrologus and the Epistola was a notation that used color to

28 Dolores Pesce
.2. A didactic exercise Alme rector, as presented by Guido in the Epistola.
EXAMPLE 2
distinguish two vital pitches, F and C, both of which have a semitone below
them/ 4 These colors allow a singer to discern visually when a semitone ap-
pears in a phrase of a new melody, reinforcing his awareness of the "property"
of the tone that governs that phrase*
Thus, Guide's new singing method consisted of the a priori learning
of a tone's "property" (using Ut queant laxis and Alme rector), which is then
applied by association with Ut queant laxis at the time of hearing or sight-
reading a new melody, and reinforced in the latter case by the visual aid of
colored lines. Guide's method required that a singer train his senses to per-
ceive correctly, and then reflect upon what is transmitted. Both the associa-
tive Ut queant laxis and the more abstract exercise Alme rector can instill in a
singer "tone-consciousness," so that the singer can apply his previous knowl-
edge to a new situation rather than start from scratch. At the moment of
sight-reading or hearing a new song, the singer perceives and recognizes the
property of a tone and thus acts knowingly, although this knowledge is not
of the detailed acoustical-theoretical sort that was fostered by Pythagorean
writers.15 It arises, instead, primarily through a combination of sensory and
intellectual experience—a sensus that is both corporeal and mental. Thus,
the musicus/'cantor distinction is blurred: Guide's "musician" is a thinking
practitioner.
Returning to example 2.1, we now explore how exactly Guido tells us to
use Ut queant laxis:16
Guido d'Arezzo, Ut queant laxis, and Musical Understanding * 29
TABLE 2.1. Descents and Ascents from Each Starting Pitch of Ut queant laxis.
ut C ascent of a fourth
re D descent of a second, ascent of a second
mi E descent of a third, ascent of a third
fa F descent of a third, ascent of a third
sol G descent of a fourth, ascent of a second
la a descent of a third
And thus do you see that this melody begins in each of its six phrases with
six different pitches? If someone, thus trained, knows the beginning of every
phrase so that he can without hesitation immediately begin any phrase he
chooses, he will easily be able to sing the same six pitches according to their
properties wherever they appear. Also, when you hear any neume that has
not been written down, consider which of these phrases is better adapted
to its ending, so that the final pitch of the neume and the beginning of the
phrase may be of the same pitch.
Guido explicitly says: learn the phrases of the hymn, each of which
starts on a different pitch. Then, match the final pitch of the new melody to
the opening pitch of one of the hymn's phrases. Guido's wording—"consider
which of these phrases is better adapted to the new melody's ending"—rests
on an assumption that one should know what goes on within the hymn's
phrase, that is, how the intervals are situated around the starting pitch.
Then, given that one knows that phrase of Ut queant laxis well, one can
more easily learn the new melody, which would presumably have the same
arrangement of intervals around its final pitch. However, interpreting Guido
literally is problematic. Table 2.1 shows the actual descents and ascents from
each starting pitch of the hymn, with ut positioned on C. The phrase be-
ginning on D lacks an adequate amount of surrounding interval motion
to differentiate it from G—both ascend only a second, whereas it takes an
ascent of a third to distinguish them. One has to consider D in relation-
ship to the whole six-note segment (ut-la) in order to understand its tonal
property. Therefore, a less literal interpretation of Guido's words would be:
match the final pitch of the new melody to the opening pitch of one of the
hymn's phrases because they share the same arrangement of intervals within
the six-note segment. A possible scenario in practice would be: take a new
melody that ends on D. Sing all of Ut queant laxis, then start over and stop
when you get to the first tone of the second phrase. Think about how that
tone "feels" or is situated with respect to the intervals around it. Now sing

3o Dolores Pesce
your new melody and make sure that it ends with the same "feeL" This seems
a reasonable interpretation of how Guido intended Ut queant laxis to serve
associative learning*
One can take this discussion a step further and reflect on the degree
to which Guido retained traditional associative melodies such as Primum
querite as a means of identifying the mode of a chant/ 8 To that end, a largely
undiscussed passage in the Epistola is of interest* Following the letter in which
Guido informs his friend Michael about his method of using Ut queant laxis,
we find an overview of Guide's pitch theory* After he presents intervals and
related tones, Guido takes the phrase Tu Patris sempiternus es Filus from the
Te Deum and presents it at four different pitch levels* He states: "In accor-
dance with the fact that these pitches have a different arrangement of tones
and semitones, one may thus sing that melody in various modes according to
the property of every single sound*"15
Thus, he reintroducesproprietas or "property," which he had first broached
when discussing the intervallic quality of each starting tone of the Ut queant
laxis phrases* But he has now linked that concept to mode: If one changes
a melody to a different pitch, one changes the proprietas, and therefore, one
changes the mode* The next connection is also of interest:
So, it ought to be considered carefully regarding every song according to
which kind of property it sounds, whether at the beginning or at the end,
although we are accustomed to speak only of the end* Certain neumes have
been invented, by whose shape we are accustomed to observe this, as for
example: Primum querite regnum Dei. Secundum autem simile est kuic. For,
when after some chant has ended, you see that this neume agrees well with
that ending, you recognize at once that that chant ending is in the first
mode*20
This seems to be a retreat into a tried and true method of modal recogni-
tion—match your melody to one of the eight well-known melodic formulas
and you thus know its mode* But Guido here links the formulas to the pre-
ceding discussion of proprietas: you recognize the "property" of the new song
by matching up the melody with a designated melody that reveals the same
property, and in turn the mode* He thus points out a complementary rela-
tionship between this associative method of modal identification familiar to
singers and his intervallic way of thinking related to proprietas; he encourages
using the modal formulas with some recognition of the principles behind
them—that is, in an informed way*
Guido d'Arezzo, Ut queant laxis, and Musical Understanding • 31
We come full circle, then, to the issue of "understanding*" A Guidonian
singer would begin his interval training by gaining an aural memory of how
Ut queant laxis flows* But to use it effectively, he would have to understand its
core information: that within the totality of the six-note configuration ut-la,
a given tone has a contextual identity—a property—that can be abstracted
and matched to a new melody that ends on that same tone* We return to the
earlier hypothetical scenario: Take a new melody that ends on D* Sing all of
Ut queant laxis, then start over and stop when you get to the first tone of the
second phrase* Think about how that tone "feels" or is situated with respect
to the intervals around it* Now sing your new melody and make sure that it
ends with the same "feel*" Intellect and senses combine in this experience*
We can extrapolate from what Guido explicitly says to this model of musical
understanding*21
One final point takes us back to the Primum querite formulas and their
lingering importance in Guido s theory within the Epistola. He had integrated
them into his theory of pitch property instead of discarding them altogether*
He could perhaps be considered conservative for doing so, but I prefer to
think of this as a practical pedagogical solution* By retaining a feature of tra-
ditional training, he was able to adapt what his singers already knew, rather
than start from scratch with a new method* Undoubtedly Guido encouraged
a greater reliance on intervallic hearing and reading in the Epistola than he
had in the Micrologus. He may have envisioned an eventual learning state in
which the melodic formulas were unnecessary* In the meantime his prefer-
ence, as expressed to Brother Michael, was that his singers use his Ut queant
laxis melody, which neatly and succinctly embodies all pitch properties in one
device* Leading to a musical understanding that is born of sensory percep-
tion and intellect, it constitutes Guido's legacy to music pedagogy up to the
present day*
In closing, I want to bring into focus how Guido s approach to informed
singing fits into the wider context of medieval speculative philosophy, for
his concerns with the senses and intellect as mutual guides to musical un-
derstanding are broadly reflective of the debates of his day* Beginning in the
ninth century and with a second wave in the eleventh, thinkers debated how
to understand the Eucharist, that is, whether the bread and wine are the body
and blood of Christ in veritate (in truth) or merely in figura (symbolically)*
On one side of the argument, the physical implied the spiritual, and did not
need interpretation; God's Word, available through Scripture, supplied the
link between the two* On the other side, some writers recognized that sen-

32 * Dolores Pesce
sory data were the starting point for all genuine understanding, but that the
mind played the crucial role in reaching that understanding* So, in the case of
the Eucharist, the bread and wine are apprehended as such exteriorly by the
senses; but they assume spiritual significance as the body and blood of Christ
only interiorly, that is, the mind interprets them as symbols*22
Outside the question of the Eucharist, the relative roles played by the
senses and the intellect figured in the more general discussions of language
and meaning that channeled into Abelard's philosophy of language in the
twelfth century*23 Boethius was important to these discussions since he had
translated and commented on Aristotle's De interpretatione, which, with
Boethius's commentary, formed the basis for Abelard's own commentary*
Boethius, who was known throughout the Middle Ages, comments on the
interrelationship of language with sense, imagination, and understanding*
He states:
For intellections rest on the foundation of sense and imagination, like a fully
colored painting on the backdrop of a pencil sketch. In other words, they
provide a substratum for the soul's perceptions. When a thing is seized by
the sense or imagination, the mind first creates a mental image of it; later,
a fuller understanding emerges as the hitherto confused pictures are sifted
and coordinated.
He continues:
But these very products of the mind generate intellections in their wake:
For instance, if one sees a sphere or a square, one grasps its shape in the
mind. But one also reflects on the likeness while it is in the mind, and,
having experienced this mental process, readily recognizes the object when
it reappears. Every image mediated by the senses is capable of generating a
likeness of this type. The mind, when it engages in understanding, reasons
through such forms.24
Boethius's discussion resonates with the interpretation offered here of
how Guido intended his singers to reach musical understanding* Guido pro-
vided his singers with aids by which they could internalize a sense of a pitch's
proprietas or property: Ut queant laxis and Alme rector. This stage resembles
Boethius's "grasp[ing] its shape in the mind*" Then, when the'singer sight-
reads or hears a new song, he or she perceives and recognizes the property of
the tone on which the song ends as being similar to the property of one of the
tones that have been ingrained in the mind's memory* This stage resembles
Guido d'Arezzo, Ut queant laxis, and Musical Understanding • 33
Boethius's "readily recognizing the object when it reappears, for every image
mediated by the senses is capable of generating a likeness of this type*"25 Gui-
do's singer thus sings knowingly, fueled by a combination of sensory percep-
tion and intellect* When Guido instituted his pedagogical approach based on
Ut queant laxis, he offered for those of his time, and of the future, a concrete
realization of Boethius's last phrase in the above citation: "The mind, when it
engages in understanding, reasons through such forms*"26
NOTES
1, An overview of solmization is found in Andrew Hughes and Edith Gerson-Kiwi,
"Solmization," in Grove Music Online. See Oxford Music Online: www,oxfordmusiconline
*com/subscriber/article/grove/music/26i54 (accessed 25 September 2008).
2, Gottfried Friedlein, ed,, Anicii Manlii Torquati Severini Boetii De Institutione Ar-
ithmetica Libri Duo, De Institutione Musica Libri Quinque (Leipzig: Teubner, 1867), 223-25;
trans, Calvin M, Bower, in Fundamentals of Music (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1989), 50-51; and in Oliver Strunk and Leo Treitler, eds,, Source Readings in Music History
(New York: W. W, Norton, 1998), 142-43.
3. Guido commented in both the Micrologus and Epistola that he did not wish to pres-
ent musical matters that were of little benefit to singing. In the Micrologus, he turned to the
"science" of music only in the last chapter, entitled "How the nature of music was discovered
from the sound of hammers," The Epistola ends with a reference to Boethius, "whose book
is useful to philosophers only, not to singers," See Dolores Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule
rithmice, Prologus in antiphonarium, and Epistola ad michahelem: A Critical Text and Trans-
lation with an Introduction, Annotations, Indices, and New Manuscript Inventories (Ottawa:
Institute of Mediaeval Music, 1999), 531,
Lawrence Gushee comments, "The pragmatic emphasis of the Micrologus is not, in
my opinion, a new phenomenon, but the resolution of ambiguous views of the positions of
musicus and cantor that had existed since Aurelian at least," See his "Questions of Genre
in Medieval Treatises on Music," in Gattungen der Musik in Einzeldarstellungen: Gedenk-
schrift Leo Schrade, ed. Wulf Arlt, Ernst Lichtenhahn, and Hans Oesch (Bern and Munich:
Francke, 1973), 409; see also pp, 368-72, 407-408, Another important study on the subject
of musicus and cantor is Erich Reimer, "Musicus und Cantor: Zur Sozialgeschichte eines
musikalischen Lehrstucks," Archivfur Musikwissenschaft 35 (1978): 3-32,
4. For the Micrologus, see Guido d'Arezzo, Micrologus, ed. Joseph Smits van Waes-
berghe, Corpus Scriptorum de Musica 4 ([Nijmegen, Netherlands]: American Institute of
Musicology, 1955); see also Hucbald, Guido, and John on Music: Three Medieval Treatises, ed.
Claude V. Palisca, trans. Warren Babb (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978), 57-83,
The Micrologus usage is less relevant to the present discussion: "Nee mirum regulas musi-
cam a finali voce sumere, cum et in grammaticae partibus pene ubique vim sensus in ultimis
litteris vel syllabis per casus, numeros, personas, tempora discernimus" (van Waesberghe,
CSM 4:145). Sensus here seems to suggest "meaning,"
5. Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule, 327-403.
6. Ibid., 405-35.
7, Ibid,, 437-531.
8, Ibid,, 406-407: "Temporibus nostris super omnes homines fatui sunt cantores.
In omni enim arte valde plura sunt que nostro sensu cognoscimus, quam ea que a magistro
didicimus,"

34 Dolores Pesce
9. Charlton T. Lewis, A Latin Dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984), 1670-71.
Charles Du Fresne Du Cange, Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis (Graz: Akademische
Druck-U. Verlagsanstalt, 1954) defines sensus as intellectus, while intellectus, in turn, in-
cludes sensory perception and mental understanding, as well as moral consciousness.
10. Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule, 330—33: "Musicorum et cantorum magna est distan-
tia; isti dicunt, illi sciunt, que componit musica. Nam qui facit quod non sapit, difnnitur
bestia."
11. Guido discusses monochord divisions and the resulting intervals in the Micrologus,
chaps. 3-6. In chap. 4, referring to the six intervals, his directive is: "Since all melody is
formed by so few formulas [clausulae], it is most helpful to commit them firmly to memory,
and, until they are completely perceived and recognized in singing, never to stop practicing
them, since when you hold these as keys, you can command skill in singing—intelligent-
ly, and therefore more easily" (Babb, Hucbald, Guido, and John, 61). The original here is:
"Cumque tarn paucis clausulis tota harmonia formetur, utillimum est altae eas memoriae
commendare, et donee plene in canendo sentiantur et cognoscantur, ab exercitio numquam
cessare, ut his velut clavibus habitis canendi possis peritiam sagaciter ideoque facilius
possidere" (van Waesberghe, CSM 4: 105-106). Babb thus translates sagaciter as "intel-
ligently," but its root sagax allows for quick perception by either the senses or intellect.
Guide's corresponding discussion in the Regule occurs in lines 30—118; see Pesce, Guido
d'Arezzo's Regule, 336-53.
12. Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule, 466—67 and appendix C. The hymn Ut queant laxis
as Guido described it now appears in chant-books for the Nativity of St. John the Baptist on
24 June, with its phrases starting successively on the pitches C, D, E, F, G, and a. The text
was associated with eight different liturgical melodies through the twelfth century, but none
matches the Guidonian profile. Although there is no conclusive evidence, scholars infer that
Guido composed the melodic version of the hymn as we know it. See in particular Jacques
Chailley, "Ut queant laxis et les origines de la gamme,» Acta musicologica 56 (1984): 48-69.
13. Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule, 472-75 and appendix C. The rubrics found next
to each phrase inform us whether or not the intervallic configuration of that particular
phrase can be found at more than one starting pitch. See discussion of related tones in
ibid., 20—22.
14. Guido discussed the idea of colored notation in the Prologus; see ibid., 418-31.
15. In his discussion of monochord divisions, Guido promoted a basic understanding
of string ratios. See Micrologus, chaps. 3—6, and 20. The Pythagorean number information
could add another level of meaning for some people and Guido acknowledged the utility of
learning it, but not in the context of singing.
16. What follows is an elaboration of ideas presented in Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule,
19—20, 23—26.
17. Ibid., 468—69: "Vides itaque, ut hec symphonia senis particulis suis a sex diversis
incipiat vocibus? Si quis itaque uniuscuiusque particule caput ita exercitatus noverit, ut
confestim quamcumque particulam voluerit, indubitanter incipiat, easdem sex voces ubi-
cumque viderit secundum suas proprietates facile pronuntiare poterit. Audiens quoque
aliquam neumam sine descriptione, perpende que harum particularum eius fini melius
aptetur, ita ut finalis vox neume et principalis particule equisone sint."
18. Byzantine intonation formulas (enechemata), with nonsense "words" set to them
as identifications of the individual modes, are found in all Carolingian tonaries until the
mid-eleventh century, and in some cases as late as the twelfth. These formulas end with
long melismas on the "words" noenoeane for the authentic modes and noeagis for the pla-
gal modes. Model antiphons beginning Primum querite provided another way to identify
mode; of unknown origin, they were introduced with the intonation formulas and ulti-
mately displaced them. These antiphons ended with the same melismas as the intona-
Guido d'Arezzo, Ut queant laxis, and Musical Understanding • 35
tion formulas. See Michel Huglo, "Tonary" (§ 2), in Grove Music Online. Oxford Music
Online: www.oxfordmusiconline.com/subscriber/article/grove/music/28iO4 (accessed 25
September 2008).
19. Pesce, Guido d'Arezzo's Regule, 496—97: "Et secundum quod ipse voces diversam
habent tonorum et semitoniorum positionem, sic variis modis secundum uniuscuiusque
proprietatem earn pronuntiet."
20. Ibid., 498-500: "Igitur curiose est intendendum de omni melo, secundum cuiu-
smodi proprietatem sonet, sive in principio sive in fine, quamvis de solo fine dicere soleamus.
Quedam enim neume reperte sunt, quarum aptitudine hoc solemus advertere, utpote: Pri-
mum querite regnum Dei. Secundum autem simile est huic. Cum enim finite aliquo cantu
hanc neumam in eius fine bene videris convenire, statim cognoscis quia cantus ille finitus
sit in primo modo ..."
21. See Klaus-Jiirgen Sachs, "Tradition und Innovation bei Guido von Arezzo," in
Kontinuitat und Transformation der Antike im Mittelalter: Veroffentlichung der Kongreftak-
ten zum Freiburger Symposion des Mediavistenverbandes, ed. Willi Erzgraber (Sigmaringen:
Thorbecke, 1989), 237-38. Sachs argues that, since Guido urges the singer to seek proof of
intervals through monochord measurements (in the Micrologus and Regule), he has not dis-
carded the Pythagorean tradition, but instead echoes the Boethian division into sensus and
ratio, "die beidenpartes iudicii der armonica vis." On the other hand, Sachs takes Guide's use
of sensus in the sentence quoted earlier from the Prologus (11.1—3) to mean an amalgamation
of the senses and intellect.
22. The Eucharistic debate between the ninth and twelfth centuries is discussed by
Brian Stock in a chapter entitled "The Eucharist and Nature," in The Implications of Lit-
eracy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983). See esp. pp. 259—73, where Stock discusses
two ninth-century writers, Paschasius Radbertus and Ratramnus of Corbie, who respec-
tively supported the idea of the bread and wine as a "mark of truth" and as a symbol.
23. The Cambridge Companion to Abelard, ed. Jeffrey E. Brower and Kevin Guilfoy
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), includes a chapter on Abelard's "philoso-
phy of language," by Klaus Jacobi.
24. These translations of Boethius's commentary on Aristotle, Commentarii in Librum
Aristotelis Peri ermeneias, are taken from Stock's chapter, "Language, Texts, and Reality,"
in The Implications of Literacy, 366—72.
25. Mary Carruthers, in The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), discusses how a mnemonic structure can
have heuristic value as an elementary device for retaining and recollecting materials, yet
not necessarily hermeneutic value as an interpretation of their meaning. She mentions
how in the fourteenth century, Robert of Basevorn used the solmization syllables to cre-
ate a division into six of the theme "Ego vox clamantis in deserto, parate viam Domini,"
in which the six syllables are the first words of the six subdivisions (p. 105). According to
Carruthers, "This is a most revealing application of the technique called 'solmization/ for
it shows that Robert of Basevorn understood that the device was primarily a mnemonic,
and could thus be utilized in non-musical contexts" (p. 106). The present essay argues that
Guido envisioned his syllables being used in a more meaningful way than Carruthers's
specific statement about solmization allows, because, viewed in their entirety within the six-
note segment,-they "embody" all essential pitch principles. Carruthers's more general point
about how mnemonics work brings in the concept of "likeness" discussed above: "'rules'
were thought to be, as Aristotle says, built up from repeated memories, the principle being
to recognize and organize likeness, even in things never seen before. This is not mnemonic
in the restricted sense that moderns tend to understand it, but in the larger sense of how
all learning takes place" (p. 106).
36 • Dolores Pesce

26 As suggested above, the written enters into this discussion of musical learning
when Guido prescribes using colored staff lines to accentuate where semitones occur ma
melody's unfolding. This visual aid reinforces a singer's awareness of the property of the
tone that governs a phrase, and thus plays into the signification of tonal property. It re-
mains unclear, however, whether Guido required the written component at an early stage
of learning, or whether he may have considered the oral use of Ut queant laxts and Alme
rector to be sufficient.

CHARLES M. ATKINSON

Given that many musicologists hold academic positions, and given the aca-
demic culture we have all grown up in, pedagogy is a topic with which we are
all familiar. Moreover, many of the primary sources we work with—especially
if our research is oriented toward intellectual history—have some didactic
purpose. One might therefore assume that an examination of music pedagogy
in a well-researched period such as the Carolingian era would be a relatively
easy task. That proves to be an incorrect assumption. The mere fact that one
occupies oneself with music as a part of the intellectual history of the Middle
Ages does not mean that one actually knows what was taught on that subject
in monastic and cathedral schools in the eighth and ninth centuries. We can
know what was recommended to be taught, and we can gain some idea of what
teaching materials were available—but finding out what was actually taught
about music in Carolingian schools is no easy matter. The present study will
briefly address each of these issues in order to gain some insight into the na-
ture and character of music instruction during the Carolingian era.
Most readers of this essay will be at least somewhat familiar with what
Charlemagne and his "Minister of Education," Alcuin of York (ca. 735—804),
thought should be the subject matter taught in schools of the Prankish King-
dom. Two capitularies issued by Charlemagne document the importance he