The texts of this cycle were edited according to the manuscript D-Mbs 3154 (ff. 43v–48v), known as ‘Nicolaus Leopold Codex’.^[1]

The scribe who copied the texts of this cycle was not very careful and he committed a series of mistakes, either omitting words (for instance the word Iesus in motet 3 and in in motet 7) or copying grammatically incorrect words; for instance, in motet 8 he copied ‘conditor’ (‘creator’), a noun, instead of ‘conditur’ (‘is created’), the verb needed in the sentence. Furthermore, in motet 4 he copied ‘humerus’ (‘the shoulder’) as a nominative singular instead of ‘humeris’ (‘with his shoulders’), an ablative plural. Another interesting characteristic of this scribe is his orthography: not only did he spell Iesus as ‘Ihesus’, but also he generally substituted y for double ii (‘testimonys’ for testimoniis in motet 3, ‘subyt’ for subiit in motet 7).

As in the other motet cycle transmitted in this codex, Gaude flore virginali, in Natus sapientia as well the composer utilized only one poetic text for his music, instead of creating a patchwork composition with different text snippets as in Compère’s cycles (Ave Domine Iesu Christe, Ave virgo gloriosa, and Hodie nobis de virgine).^[2] The source from which the composer of the cycle drew the texts is the poem or rhymed prayer known as Patris sapientia and attributed to Aegidius Colonna. This poem celebrated the passion of Jesus by recalling the different sorrows and the hours of the day and night at which each sorrow supposedly happened (‘Deus homo captus est hora matutina’, ‘at the morning hour the God made man was captured’; ‘Hora prima ductus est Iesus ad Pilatum’, ‘at the first hour Jesus was brought in front of Pilatus’, and so on). In this way the prayer enabled the lay believer not only to recall the Passion, but also to imitate the Liturgy of the Hours that structured the life of religious communities by connecting the hours of Jesus’s passion with the hours of prayer.^[3]

Only one interpolation was made in this poem, namely in motet 5, where the short Christological prayer ‘Adoramus te, Christe, et benedicimus tibi, quia per sanctam crucem tuam redemisti mundum’ was added. This prayer is also found in Compère’s cycle Ave virgo gloriosa, where it was used in the motet accompanying the Canon missae or motet ad Elevationem.^[4] This suggests that in the present cycle as well the motet containing this prayer (motet 5) could have been composed or at least used as an ad Elevationem piece.

While the ‘standard’ text of this hymn contained in AH 30, no. 13, pp. 32–35, begins with the words ‘Patris sapientia’, the incipit transmitted in the motet cycle is nearly unique: the variant ‘Natus sapientia’ is known from only one other source, a fourteenth-century manuscript (Vienna, Schottenstift, Bibliothek, Cod. 231 [Hübl 157]). This codex, which was lost in the 1920s,^[5] transmitted a calendar for a French-speaking region, a résumé of the four Gospels, various prayers in Latin and French, and the Penitential Psalms, as well as our text under the rubric ‘hymni de passione Domini ad horas canonicas cum orationibus’.^[6]

^[1] For further literature see Felix Diergarten, ‘“Gaude flore virginali” – Message from the “Black Hole”?’, in Motet Cycles between Devotion and Liturgy, ed. Daniele V. Filippi and Agnese Pavanello, Scripta 7 (Basel: Schwabe, 2019), 429–55, at 430–31.

^[2] See ibid., 443–44, and Daniele V. Filippi’s introductions to MCE 1, 2, and 3.

^[3] See Josef Stadlhuber, ‘Das Laienstundengebet vom Leiden Christi in seinem mitteralterlichen Fortleben’, Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, 72, no. 3 (1950), 282–325, at 307–8.

^[4] See Agnese Pavanello, ‘The Elevation as Liturgical Climax in Gesture and Sound: Milanese Elevation Motets in Context’, Journal of the Alamire Foundation, 9, no. 1 (2017), 33–59, and the introduction to MCE 3.

^[5] See Manuscripta.at: Mitteralterliche Handschriften in Österreich (https://manuscripta.at/hs_detail.php?ID=28721&IDinitia=145674).

^[6] Albert Hübl, Catalogus codicum manuscriptorum qui in bibliotheca monasterii B.M.V. ad Scotos Vindobonae servantur (Vienna; Leipzig: Braumüller, 1899), 174–75.