Eli, eli, lamma sabacthani: Choral Melodies to Passion Words in Three Ljubljana Manuscripts

Abstract

Our contribution presents the choral melodies for Christ 's last words in the Passions of three Ljubljana manuscripts. On the preserved fragment of missale plenarium, which comes from the time before the second half of the 13th cent., there is written the melody for Christ's last words on the cross according to St. Matthew Passion (Example 1, A). This melody is related to the melody for the same words in the manuscript Cod. B 50, kept in the Vallicellana library in Rome (Example 1, B), as well as to the melody quoted by Stäblein in MMG as a frequent one in German sources (Example 1, C). The fragment of missale plenarium is privately owned. The lectionary kept in the Episcopal Archives in Ljubljana (ŠAL, Manuscript 5) comes from the 14th cent. and was probably used in the parish church at Kranj. For Christ's last words on the cross according the St. Matthew, St. Mark and St. Luke it has the same melody. On the fringe of the folio, where the melody in St. Matthew Passion is written down, there is also the later diastemic rendering of the first three musical signs of the melody (Example 2). The manuscript kept in the National and University Library in Ljubljana, Ms 248, contains the text and the music of all four Passions. Christ's last words on the cross have in all four Passions a longer melismatic melody (Examples 3-6).