La Trobe University - Library: Medieval Music Database - Annual cycle of feasts of liturgical chant, liturgical polyphony and secular music of the late middle ages.

Aquila altera - Uccel di Dio - Creatura gentil

Triple-texted madrigal by Jacopo da Bologna

Sources

Florence: Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana, Palatino 87 (Squarcialupi Codex), fol. 8v-9 (3/3); Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Palatino 315, fol. 97 (text); Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Panciatichiano 26, fol. 91v-92 (3/3); San Lorenzo, Archivio Capitolare 2211 [palimpsest], fol. 48v-49;
Paris: Bibliothèque Nationale, fonds italien 568, fol. 2v-3 (3/3); Bibliothèque Nationale, fonds nouv. acq. français 6771 (Reina Codex), fol. 2v-3 (3/3).

Facsimiles

1. WOLF, Johannes. Musikalische Schrifttafeln, Leipzig: 1923, no. 79 (Fl87).
2. APEL, Willi. The Notation of Polyphonic Music 900-1600, Cambridge/Massachusetts: The Medieval Academy of America, 1942, p. 375 (Pn568).
3. Il codice musicale Panciatichi 26 della Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze, facsimile edition by F. Alberto Gallo, Florence: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1981, no. 163 (FP).
4. Il Codice Squarcialupi edited by F. Alberto GALLO, Lucca: Libreria Musicale Italiana, 1992.

Editions

1. The Music of Jacopo da Bologna, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco, Berkeley: University of California, 1954. University of California Publications in Music 5, p. 31 (Fn26).
2. Die mittelalterliche Mehrstimmigkeit, edited by Heinrich Husmann, Cologne: Arno Volk Verlag, 1954. Das Musikwerk IX. [English edition as Medieval Polyphony, Anthology of Music IX, 1962], p. 50 (Fn26).
3. Der Squarcialupi-Codex Pal. 87 der Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana zu Florenz, edited by Johannes Wolf and H. Albrecht, Lippstadt: Kistner and Siegel, 1955, p. 19.
4. The Music of Fourteenth-Century Italy, edited by Nino Pirrotta, Rome: American Institute of Musicology, 1963. Corpus Mensurablis Musicae 8/IV, p. 1.
5. Italian Secular Music by Magister Piero, Giovanni da Firenze and Jacopo da Bologna, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco, Monaco: Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre, 1967. Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century VI, p. 80 (Fn26).
6. Keyboard Music of the Late Middle Ages in the Codex Faenza 117, edited by D. Plamenac, [n.p.]: American Institute of Musicology, 1972. Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 57, p. 80 (Fn26).
7. Three Madrigals by Jacopo da Bologna, edited by Nigel Wilkins, Devon: Antico Edition AE 5, 1986, p. 11 (Pn6771).
8. Medieval Music, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco and Nicholas Sandon, London: Oxford University Press, 1977, no. 76.

Text Editions

CORSI, Giuseppe. Poesie musicali del Trecento, Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1970, p. 29.

Literature

1. APEL, Willi. The Notation of Polyphonic Music 900-1600, Cambridge/Massachusetts: The Medieval Academy of America, 1942, pp. 374, 376, & example 48.
2. PIRROTTA, Nino. 'La caccia e il madrigale trecentesco', Rivista musicale italiana, XLIX (1947), pp. 134-135.
3. MARTINEZ, Marie L. Die Musik des frühen Trecento, Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 1963. Münchener Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 9.
4. FISCHER, Kurt von. 'Elementi arsnovistici nella musica boema antica', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento: Certaldo 1961-1967, 1968, p. 77.
5. FELLIN, Eugene C. A Study of Superius Variants in the Sources of Italian Trecento Music: Madrigals and Cacce, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Wisconsin: 1970, passim.
6. MARROCCO, W. Thomas. 'Integrative devices in the music of the Italian Trecento', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento III: Certaldo 1969, 1970, p. 415.
7. THIBAULT, Geneviève. 'Emblèmes et devises des Visconti dans les oeuvres musicales du Trecento', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento III: Certaldo 1969, 1970, p. 138.
8. FISCHER, Kurt von. 'Musica e società nel Trecento italiano', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento III: Certaldo 1969, 1970, p. 19.
9. FISCHER, Kurt von. 'Ältere und jüngere Stilelemente in der böhmischen Musik des 14. bis 16. Jahrhunderts', Hudebni Veda (1971), p. 442.
10. FISCHER, Kurt von. 'Zum Wort-Ton Problem in der Musik des italienischen Trecento', Festschrift Arnold Geering zum 70. Geburtstag, Bern-Stuttgart: P. Haupt, 1972, p. 58.
11. CAVICCHI, Adriano. 'Sacro e profano: documenti e note su Bartolomeo da Bologna e gli organisti della cattedrale di Ferrara nel primo Quattrocento', Rivista italiana di musicologica, X (1975), p. 70.
12. FELLIN, Eugene C. 'The notation-types of Trecento music', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento IV: Certaldo 1975, 1978, pp. 211-224.
13. BAUMANN, Dorothea. Die dreistimmige italienische Lied-Satztechnik im Trecento, Baden-Baden: Valentin Koerner, 1979. Sammlung musikwissenschaftlicher Abhandlung no. 64, passim.
14. WILKINS, Nigel. Music in the Age of Chaucer, Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 1979. Chaucer Studies I, pp. 54, 56.
15. BROWN, Howard M. 'The Trecento harp', Studies in the Performance of Late Mediaeval Music, edited by Stanley Boorman, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983, pp. 56-57.
16. D'ACCONE, Frank. 'Una nuova fonte dell' "Ars nova" italiana: il codice di San Lorenzo, 2111', Studi Musicali, XIII (1984): 3-31.
17. FISCHER, Kurt von. 'Sprache und Musik im italienischen Trecento: Zur Frage einer Frührenaissance', Musik und Text in der Mehrstimmigkeit des 14. und 15. Jahrhunderts, edited by U. Günther and L. Finscher, Kassel: Bärenreiter: 1984, p. 49.
18. GALLO, F. Alberto. 'The musical and literary tradition of 14th century poetry set to music', Musik und Text in der Mehrstimmigkeit des 14. und 15. Jahrhunderts, edited by U. Günther and L. Finscher, Kassel: Bärenreiter: 1984, pp. 55-76.
19. CILIBERTI, Galliano. Prodizione, consumo e diffusione della musica in Italia nel tardo medioevo, Perugia: Centro di Studi Musicali in Umbria, 1989, p. 19.
20. NADAS, John. 'Editorial practices in early Quattrocento Florentine anthologies of secular polyphony', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento VI: Certaldo 1984, Certaldo: Centro di Studio L'ars nova italiana, 1992.

Recordings

1. Italian Secular Music of the Trecento, Hortus Musicus, directed by Andres Moustonen: Chant du Monde LDX 78.665 (FRA).
2. The Italian Trecento, Columbia University Collegium Musicum, directed by Richard Taruskin: Collegium Stereo JE 105.
3. Codex Faenza. Italie XVe siècle, : .
4. Jacopo da Bologna: Italienische Madrigale des 14. Jahrhunderts, P.A.N. Ensemble Project Ars Nova (1985): Harmonia Mundi HM 738A.
5. Two Gentlemen of Verona, Ensemble of the Fourteenth Century, directed by John Griffiths and John Stinson (1987): Move MC 3091.
6. Bestiarium, Elisabetta de' Mircovich, Claudia Caffagni, Ella de' Mircovich, Livia Caffagni, La Reverdie (1991): Nuova Era 6970.

Text

Aquila altera, ferma in su la vetta
de l'alta mente l'ochio valoroso,
dove tuo vita prende suo riposo.
Là è 'l parer e là l'esser beato.

Uccel di Dio, insegna di giustizia,
tu hai principalmente chiara gloria,
perché ne le grand'opre è tua vittoria.
Là vidi l'ombra e là la vera essenza.

Creatura gentil, animal degno,
salire in alto e rimirare 'l sole
singularmente tuo natura vole.
Là è l'imagine e la perfezione

Translation

Haughty eagle, turn your heroic eye
to the summit of the lofty mind [God]
where your life takes its repose.
There the state of bliss both seems and is.

Bird of God, symbol of justice,
your glory is prized above all,
because your great deeds are crowned by victory.
There you see the shadow, and there the true essence.

Gentle creature, noble animal,
singlemindedly your nature wants
to rise high and to contemplate the sun.
There is the image and the perfection.
Text revision and translation © Giovanni Carsaniga