GB-Lbl Add. MS 4911
London, British Library, Add. MS 4911 (Scottish Anonymous, The Art of Music)
Provenance: Copied in Scotland (probably Edinburgh or Aberdeen), ca. 1580.
Unpublished edition and study: Judson Dana Maynard, "An Anonymous Scottish Treatise on Music from the Sixteenth Century, British Museum, Additional Manuscript 4911, Edition and Commentary." Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University, 1961.
Source of example in Choralis Constantinus II: Heyden, Musicae.
Choralis Constantinus II contents:
- Mass 25
- Sequence, v. 2 (fols. 43v-44r)
Character of the Choralis Constantinus II example:
The example matches Heyden's version quite closely, including all of the errors in the source, except that the Օ3 in the bass (m. 4) of the original and the c' in the bass (m. 2) of the resolution are corrected.
A few minor variants reflect the author's notational preferences. In perfect prolation, the semiminims and fusae are in white flagged, rather than black, forms. The initial sign in the altus is ₵, rather than Օ2 (the signs are synonymous in this context). The bass sign in m. 11 is 3/2, rather than 3/1; this is probably a careless error based on scribal habit.
The scribe had some difficulties with the altus of the original version. The Ϲ in m. 4 is squeezed in where it was evidently omitted when the notes were copied. The ₵ in m. 6 is likewise squeezed in, but it is placed one note too early. The note following it, a semibreve of Ϲ in the source, is a breve of ₵ that compensates for the error. The passage from m. 11 to the end is partially erased and crossed out, then replaced by a new version beginning with the sign Ϲ2 instead of ₵2.