The Poems of Orlando Di Lasso's "Prophetiae Sibyllarum" and Their Sources

The Poems of Orlando di Lasso's "Prophetiae Sibyllarum" and Their Sources
Author(s): Peter Bergquist

Source: Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 32, No. 3 (Autumn, 1979), pp.
516-538
Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the American Musicological
Society
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STUDIES AND REPORTS T
The Poems of Orlando di Lasso's

Prophetiae Sibyllarum and Their Sources
By PETER BERGQUIST
O RLANDO DI LASSO'S Prophetiae Sibyllarum (Sibylline Prophecies) is a cycle of

motets in which are set twelve six-line Latin poems and a three-line pro-
logue, all of which are in dactylic hexameter throughout.' Each of the twelve
poems contains what purport to be prophecies of the coming, life and
mission of Christ as foreseen by the sibyls of antiquity, and the title of each
poem identifies by location the sibyl who presumably delivered that prophe-
cy. The style of the poems is oblique, allusive, even obscure; no progression
of mood or idea through the cycle is apparent. Particular ideas do recur, such
as the birth of the Savior to the Virgin Mary and the salvation Christ brings
to sinful man. Lasso's music is notable for its extraordinary chromaticism,
which goes far beyond the norm for most of his other music, and discussion
of the work has tended to center on this aspect to the exclusion of any other,
with the partial exception of the chapter in Wolfgang Boetticher's study of
the composer.2 The literary background of the poems and the iconographic
symbolism associated with them are of considerable interest in their own
right, in addition to what they reveal about the chronology and sources of
Lasso's music, and these will be the subject of the present study.
The Prophetiae are set apart from most of Lasso's work by the nature of
their sources as well as their style. The cycle was one of the compositions
which Lasso presented to his employer and patron, Albrecht V of Bavaria, as
a private gift, like the seven Penitential Psalms. The primary source is the
set of four partbooks now in the Oesterreichisches Nationalbibliothek in
Vienna, Ms. mus. 18744, which contain the Prophetiae and also the Sacrae
lectiones ex propheta Job (Sacred readings from the prophet Job), the earlier of
the composer's settings of the latter texts. Lasso copied the music himself,
and each partbook was decorated with a portrait of him and miniatures of
each of the twelve sibyls (see Fig. i) by Hans Mielich, the Bavarian court
painter who later supplied the famous illuminations in the manuscript of the
1 The only modern edition at present is Orlando di Lasso, Prophetiae Sibyllarum,
ed. Joachim Therstappen (Das Chorwerk, 48), Wolfenbiittel, 1937.
2 Wolfgang Boetticher, Orlando di Lasso und seine Zeit (Kassel, 1958), PP. 7I-9. The
chromatics are most successfully discussed, in my opinion, in William J. Mitchell,
"The Prologue to Orlando di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum," Music Forum, II (1970),
pp. 164-73-
STUDIES AND REPORTS 517
Persica Libyca
Delphica Cymmeria
Figure i. The twelve sibyls by Hans Mielich (?), from the cantus partbook of Orlando
di Lasso's Prophetiae Sibyllarum. Original size of each minitature c. 67 x 50 cm.
(Vienna, Oesterreichisches Nationalbibliothek, MS Mus. 18744, rectos of fols. 24-35.
Reproduced by kind permission.)
5 8 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY
Samia Cumana
Hellespontica Phrygica
Figure z, continued.
Europea Tiburtina
Erythraea Agrippa
Figure i, continued.
520 JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MUSICOLOGICAL SOCIETY
Penitential Psalms. 3 The portraits in the alto and tenor books have the caption
"Orlando di Lasso at the age of twenty-eight years."4 Lasso was born in 1530
or 1532, so the manuscript would date from 1558-6o or very soon after-
wards.s The Sacrae lectiones ex propheta Job were published in 1565,6 but the
Prophetiae remained unpublished until after Lasso's death, appearing only in
I6oo00 in an edition prepared by his son Rudolph.7
How much before the date of the manuscript the Prophetiae were com-
posed has been a matter of some dispute. Boetticher has proposed a date of
about 1550-2, when Lasso was in Naples, pointing to the presence near
Naples of the hill and cave of the Cumaean Sibyl as a probable influence
which supports such an early date, in addition to internal stylistic evidence.8
Adolf Sandberger and Edward Lowinsky prefer a date nearer that of the
manuscript, after Lasso's return to Flanders,9 which occurred no later than
the beginning of 1555,10 and Alfred Einstein says the date must have been
between 1555 and I56o. 1 By that time Lasso could have seen depictions of
the sibyls in Rome, such as Michelangelo's famous frescos in the Sistine
Chapel and the twelve sibyls of Pinturicchio in the Borgia Apartments of the
Vatican, since the composer spent about two years as maestro di cappella at St.
John Lateran before his return north. (We shall see, however, that these art
works were by no means the closest pictorial influence on the composer and
the manuscript.) He would also have become acquainted with the chromatic
experiments of Rore and Vicentino in the early I55os, and he would have
heard about the debates in 1551 between Vicentino and Lusitano over the
modern use of the ancient chromatic and enharmonic genera. Sandberger
3Horst Leuchtmann, Orlando di Lasso (Wiesbaden, 1976), I, pp. 124-5, n. 144,

concludes that the Vienna manuscript is possibly in Lasso's hand, but that this cannot
be proved beyond doubt. He also accepts Mielich as the illuminator "in all probabili-
ty," evidently for lack of ultimate proof. It should be noted that Leuchtmann's re-
search on Lasso's biography supersedes all previous studies, whose inaccuracies and
misinterpretations he frequently and painstakingly corrects.
4 The portrait in the tenor book is reproduced in Boetticher, "Orlando di Lasso,"
MGG, VIII, cols. 253-4; a reproduction in color is the frontispiece of Leuchtmann.
The portrait that was once in the cantus book was removed some time before the
Nationalbibliothek acquired the manuscript.
s Leuchtmann, I, pp. 72-81, reexamines the evidence concerning Lasso's year of
birth and concludes that both 1530 and 1532 are possible; the conflicting evidence
allows no decision for one or the other, despite the preference for 1532 in recent
studies.
6 i565~ in the list of publications in Boetticher, p. 753.
7 Boetticher, p. 806, no. I6ooa.
8 Boetticher, pp. 73-4-
9 Adolf Sandberger, "Mitteilungen iiber ein Handschrift und ein neues Bildnis
Orlando di Lassos," Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Musikgeschichte (Munich, 1921), I, p. 58;
Edward E. Lowinsky, Secret Chromatic Art in the Netherlands Motet (New York, 1946),
p. 93, and Tonality and Atonality in Sixteenth-Century Music (Berkeley, 1961), p. 88.
10 Boetticher, p. 37; Leuchtmann, I, pp. 46 and 92, does not dispute this dating.
11 Alfred Einstein, The Italian Madrigal (Princeton, 1949), II, p. 480.
STUDIES AND REPORTS 5 2
suggests that Lasso may even have been present

not known with certainty.12
Boetticher thus proposes that Lasso's Proph
posers' chromatic pieces, but the opposite ass
followed the lead of his elders, seems more p
suggested on stylistic grounds that the cycle is
as late as 1585, but this is contradicted by the d
Therstappen apparently considered a seconda
ingly unaware of Sandberger's detailed descript
another cogent argument for a date after 1555,
Italy he was in a new stage of his career, in wh
afresh after his Italian successes: he was in need
reason he was publishing as much music as h
have failed to publish such substantial works as t
from Job had they been ready for the press. B
completed as we now know them only after
for Albrecht. External evidence about the prove
course be taken into account in any attempt
the present study intends to provide as much o
lay a proper foundation, though, the beginn
ment of the Christian tradition of Sibylline wri
A noted classical scholar has said, "By siby
women who in a state of ecstasy proclaimed
pleasant, spontaneously and without being as
any particular oracle site."'6 In the earliest flou
from the eighth to sixth centuries B.C., there w
sibyl, of great antiquity, who travelled mu
cultic centers were established several sibyls
her own site. Two of the most famous were
Aegean coast of Asia Minor, and the Cum
sayings of the sibyls, usually composed in Gr
down in ancient times but for the most part ha
Sibylline writings came into Christian tradit
Jews, especially those in Alexandria. From th
gan to compose books of so-called sibylline w
Roman character. Christians in the second ce
12 Sandberger, "Vorwort" to Orlando di Lasso, Sd

den, 1968), II, p. xxiv.
13 Therstappen, preface to Lasso, Prophetiae sibyll
14 Sandberger, "Mitteilungen." Lowinsky, Secret
this criticism of Therstappen's dating.
15 Leuchtmann, I, pp. i27-9.
16 Alfons Kurfess, "Christian Sibyllines," in Ed
Apocrypha, ed. Wilhelm Schneemelcher, trans. R
1965), II, p. 703. The following summary of early
drawn largely from this source.
ed to some of the Hebrew sibylline books and wrote additional books them-
selves. The Christians presented the sibyls as prophets of the coming of
Christ to the heathen, complementary to the Old Testament prophets who
proclaimed Him to the Hebrews. The pseudo-Oracula sibyllina in this form
circulated widely in the early Christian era, and the church fathers quote and
refer to them many times, but the original Greek texts were lost to the
Middle Ages and known only through these scattered quotations and refer-
ences.
In his Divinae institutiones, Book I, chapter 6 (about 30

established the number of sibyls as ten, basing his statem
rerum divinarum of the historian Marcus Varro. They
poems set by Lasso, except for the European and Agrip
added to the series in the fifteenth century. Writers imm
Lactantius also referred to sibyls. Isidore in his Etymo
chapter 8, repeats Lactantius's list of ten in somewhat
gustine in The City of God, Book XVIII, chapter 23, speak
sibyl as the one who prophesied most plainly about Ch
Last Judgment. She is probably the sibyl referred to in t
line 3: "teste David cum sibylla." The Cumaean and Ti
also celebrated individually by various writers. Virgi
spoke of a prophecy by the Cumaean sibyl which Augusti
27) and many others took to refer to the coming of Christ
a prophecy of Christ to Augustus Caesar by the Tibur
believed and circulated.
Written accounts of the sibyls seem not to have gone beyond what had
been said by the Patristic writers until the fifteenth century. Pictorial repre-
sentations can be traced back at least to the eleventh century. A manuscript
of Hrabanus Maurus's De universo, Montecassino MS 132, accompanies the
passage in which Hrabanus repeats Isidore's text almost verbatim (Book XV,
chapter 6) with miniatures of the ten sibyls. Other representations of sibyls
in groups of two, six and eight may be found prior to the fifteenth century,'7
but only after the middle of that century did the sibyls become frequent
subjects of artistic and literary works. The publication of Lactantius's Divinae
institutiones in 1465, with six further editions following to 1478, was undoubt-
edly a major stimulus to this activity.18 In 1481 another important sibylline
publication appeared in which the number of sibyls was increased to twelve,
the Discordantiae sanctorum doctorum Hieronymi et Augustini by Filippo Bar-
17 Lothar Freund, Studien zur Bildgeschichte der Sibyllen in der neueren Kunst (Ham-
burg, 1936), PP- 4-5, describes the Montecassino miniatures; elsewhere in the same
book he describes the other art works referred to in this study. Other important
accounts of the sibyls in Western art are in Xavier Barbier de Montault, Iconographie
des Sibyls," Revue de l'art chritien, XIII and XIV (I869 and I870-I), and Emile Male,
Quomodo sibyllas recentiores artifices repraesentaverint (Paris, I899). Recent summaries
such as that in Louis Rdan, Iconographie de l'art chritien (Paris, 1956), II, part I, pp.
420-30, seem not to go beyond the earlier authorities.
18 Male, p. 23.
bieri'9 (Philippus de Barberiis, born about 142

fore 13 June 1487, Palermo), who held high p
der, was Inquisitor of Sicily, and at one time
Spain on behalf of Church and Inquisition.20
the first of four miscellaneous treatises include
ond is Sibyllarum et prophetarum de Christo va
the sibyls and prophets), in which the twelve
woodcut under which is printed a brief descript
appearance, followed by her prophecy. A few of
what may be symbolic attributes, but these h
panying prophecy or to the complete set of twe
block-book to be discussed below. On the verso o
ing Old Testament prophet with his proph
twelve sibyls to the twelve minor prophets w
the increase from ten to twelve, though Barb
Jeremiah (twice) and King David rather than a
ordering of the twelve sibyls does not corres
cycle, as shown in Table I, where the ordering o
tant sources is compared.21 Following this publi
tions of twelve sibyls may be found in Western
treatise was evidently the main source for su
under the woodcuts were not written by Bar
viously; the other portions of the treatise are p
It appears, however, that Barbieri was not
influential depictor of twelve sibyls; he may hav
originate the expanded number. The earliest r
of twelve seems to be in the Roman palace of
1438), who had them painted on the walls of h
ings have not survived, but they are describe
second third of the fifteenth century.22 Anoth
Barbieri is even more significant for its relation
This is a German block-book of about 1470-5
woodcuts; it was apparently modelled on an earli
19 Rome: [Johannes Philippus de Lignamine], I D

samtkatalog der Wiegendrucke (GWD). GWD 3385 is
sixteen of the woodcuts found in GWD 3386.
20 "Filippo Barbieri," in Dizionario biografico deg
217-21.
21 The ordering given here is as in the copy of the 1481 Discordantiae in the Hunt-
ington Library. The copy in the Library of Congress, Rosenwald Collection, appears
to be incorrectly gathered and has the sibyls in a different order as a result. I do not
know if other copies may be similarly flawed.
22 Brussels, Biblioth~que royale, MSS 3553-67, cited and quoted in extenso by
Freund, pp. 21-4. On p. 22 Freund gives the date of Orsini's death as 1348, an
obvious typographical error which was unfortunately repeated by Therstappen, p. 2.
The correct date is confirmed by Ludwig Pastor, The History of the Popes (London,
1923), I, p. 273.
TABLE I
ORDER OF APPEARANCE OF THE TWELVE SIBYLS IN SOURCES FROM 1470
1505, 1510,
1514, 1545,
Source 147o-5 1481, 1482 1488 6555 t56o
I. Persica Persica Persica Persica Persica
2. Libyca Libyca Libyca Libyca Libyca
3. Erythraea Delphica Delphica Delphica Delphica
4. Cumana Cymmeria Cymmeria Cymmeria Cymmeria
5. Samia Erythraea Samia Samia Samia
6. Cymmeria Samia Hellespontica Cumana Cumana
7. Europaea Cumana Cumana Hellespontica Hellespontica
8. Tiburtina Hellespontica Phrygia Phrygia Phrygia
9. Agrippa Phrygia Tiburtina Europaea Europaea
10. Delphica Europaea Europaea Tiburtina Tiburtina
11. Hellespontica Tiburtina Agrippa Agrippa Erythraea
I2. Phrygia Agrippa Erythraea Erythraea Agrippa
SOURCES
147o-5 P. Heitz, ed., Oracula sibyllina (Strasbourg, 1903)
1481 Filippo Barbieri, Discordantiae sanctorum doctorum Hieronymi et Augustini (Rome, 14
1482 Filippo Barbieri, Tractatus sollemnis et utilis (Rome, 1482)
1488 Filippo Barbieri, De animorum immortalitate (Naples, [c. 1488])
1505 Filippo Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Venice, [c. 1505])
15 o Filippo Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Oppenheim, [c. I 5 o])
1514 Filippo Barbieri, Opusculum de vaticiniis sibillarum (Oppenheim, [c. I5141)
1545 Sixt Birken, ed., Oracula sibyllina (Basel, 1545)
t555 Sixt Birken and Sdbastien Castellion, ed., Sibyllinorum oraculorum Libri VIII (Ba
1555)
i56o Orlando di Lasso, Prophetiae sibyllarum, in Vienna, Nationalbibliothek, MS Mus.
18744 [c. 1560]
ably stems from Holland or Flanders but which no longer exists. 23 The book
is essentially a picture book with texts carved into the woodcut as captions.
Twelve cuts depict the sibyls, each seated on a throne and displaying a sym-
bolic attribute (see Fig. 2).
Each print contains a short text which gives the age of the sibyl (except
for the Phrygian sibyl), states her origin or a classical authority who mentions
her, tells the subject of her prophecy, and gives the prophecy (see Table 2 for
the symbols and ages of the sibyls). All but one of the prophecies are the
same as those which appear later in Barbieri. The attribute in each picture
relates directly to the subject and content of the prophecy. The ages and
symbols in this series correspond exactly (except for the age of the Samian
sibyl) to those in the miniatures in the Lasso partbooks, though their order in
the latter is different. Each symbol refers to an event in the life of Christ, and
in the block-book the sibyls appear in chronological order according to these
symbols, so that the series begins with the Proclamation to the Heathen,
23 Arthur M. Hind, An Introduction to a History of Woodcut (New York, 1963; re-

print of i935 ed.), I. p. 248. The block-book is reproduced in facsimile in Oracula
Sibyllina: nach dem einzigen, in der Stiftsbibliothek von St. Gallen aufbewahrten Exemplare,
ed. Paul Heitz (Strasbourg, 1903)-
4W
Persica Libyca
Figure 2. Min
c. i8o x i20 m
TABLE 2
AGES AND SYMBOLS OF THE TWELVE
Sibyl Age Symbol Mea

Sibylla persica 30 Carries
serpent underfoot
S. libyca 24 Torch in hand "The Clear Light that came
S. erythraea 15a White rose "The Annunciatio
S. cumana 18 Egg-shaped objectb "The Birth of Chr
S. samia 24C Cradle "The Child in the Ma
S. cymmeria 18 Drinking or sucking horn
S. europaea 15 Raised sword "The Slaug
S. tiburtina 20 Outstretched hand held b
the wrist by the sibyl
S. agrippa 30 Scourge "The Scourging of Ch
S. delphica 20 Crown of thorns "The Crown of Th
S. hellespontica 50 Cross "The Crucifixion
S. phrygia d Triumphal banner "The Resurrectio
Sources: 1470-5, iS6o (for source abbreviations see Table i)
a Omitted in 1470-5.
b This symbol is less clear and more variable than the others. The objec
c Samia's age is given as 15 in IS6o.
d Neither source gives her age: according to 1470-5 she is aged (vetula).
continues through the Annunciation, Birth, Flig

fixion, and concludes with the Resurrection. A
the sibyl illustrates in its upper half the even
half depicts an Old Testament prophet with his p
Evangelist and his words which refer to the e
the sibyls does not seem to recur in any subs
Barbieri's treatise and the Lasso motets, even tho
ed with individual sibyls recurs.24 The block
among the literary sources in this respect, but i
probably represents the original state of the cyc
of.
Barbieri's treatise seems to have been assembled without knowledge of

the tradition represented by the block-book, which may be assumed to be
northern; Barbieri apparently presents an Italian tradition which did not in-
clude the chronological order of symbols and prophecies. I have found no
trace of a common source for the two traditions. Barbieri's treatise was highly
popular and was reprinted four times in the following thirty years. The sec-
ond edition of the same collection of treatises appeared about 1482 in Rome
under the title Tractatus sollemnis et utilis, with the same ordering of the sibyls
and the same prophecies.25 Three of the descriptions of the sibyls were re-
vised, but the text is largely the same otherwise. The woodcuts are complete-
ly new, and the prophets are omitted altogether, not to return in any later
edition. Another edition from Naples (c. 1488) revised the text significantly.
In this publication the four treatises of the 1481 and 1482 collections are
appended to two larger treatises with the whole appearing under the title of
the first treatise in the book, De animorum immortalitate. 26 A prefatory note to
the Discordantiae states that the Rome publication was full of mistakes, and
that Barbieri asked for a new edition by a learned man who would under-
stand the text.27 The Discordantiae then appear much as in 1481 and 1482
except for some changes in the treatise on the sibyls. The order of the sibyls
is again different (see Table i) and no woodcuts are included, but the pro-
phecies are the same except for that of Hellespontica, which now has the
same prophecy as in the block-book. Other portions of the sibyl treatise are
greatly expanded. Barbieri must have had a hand in this publication, since
he was in Sicily for the last two years before his death in 1487, which
preceded the publication by less than a year.
Subsequent editions are unquestionably posthumous. The next one
24 The order seems, however, to recur in French art works of the I6th century,
according to Rdan, p. 426. Leuchtmann, I, p. I26, n. 145, notes the presence of
symbolic attributes and numerals in the Lasso manuscript and observes that they
must be taken over from the painter's source, but he does not try to explain them.
25 Rome: Herold & Reissinger, [c. 1482]; GWD 3387.
26 Barbieri, De animorum immortalitate (Naples, [c. 1488]); GWD 3388, where the
date is given as c. 1490. However, the copy in the Huntington Library has a hand-
written mark of ownership dated I May 1488.
27 Barbieri, De immortalitate, fol. h5r.
brought out the original collection of four treatises by itself again, under the
title Quattuor hic compressa opuscula. 28 The texts of the sibyl treatise have been
subject to some revision, but the order of the sibyls is again as in 1481 and
1482, except that Erythraea is moved from fifth to twelfth (see Table i). The
text is divided into chapters, and a new set of woodcuts appears, with the few
symbolic attributes similar to those of the 1481 edition. The most important
addition is that of the poems of Lasso's motet cycle, which evidently appear
in this publication for the first time. The text of the poems is essentially the
same as in later sources, differing mainly in punctuation and spelling.29 The
poems in several instances echo the prophecies under which they appear, e.g.
that of the European sibyl, though at least one poem, that of the Samian
sibyl, seems to have been placed incorrectly, since it derives rather from the
prophecy of the Libyan sibyl. The Venetian publication contains no in-
dication of the source of the poems; they simply appear without further com-
ment as a new portion of the pre-existent treatise. Any statement about their
presumed author or date of composition is necessarily speculative, but it
seems most probable that they were written for this edition of Barbieri's
treatise by an Italian humanist, most likely in Venice near the time of pub-
lication. They are not likely to predate the first edition of Barbieri some
twenty years before, since the tradition of twelve rather than ten sibyls was
not very widespread in Italy earlier than that.
The entire treatise was reprinted in Oppenheim, Germany, about 1510o,
and a separate printing of the treatise on the sibyls followed.30 The text is the
same as in the Venice edition, including the poems, and the woodcuts are
obviously copied from that source. Thus the poems came north very soon
after their presumed first appearance in print, but they seem then to drop out
of sight for some thirty years. A German translation of the treatise on the
sibyls was printed in Oppenheim in 1516, but without the Latin poems, and
it was followed by new editions in 1531, i534, 1535, and I537.31 The sibyl-
line and other pseudo-prophecies, such as those of Paracelsus, became very
popular and widespread in the vernacular after 15oo, and the sophisticated
Latin poems would have found no place in the more popular books, so it is
likely that the poems were not published again for some years, since Bar-
28 Barbieri, Quattuor hic compressa opuscula (Venice, [c. 1505]); Reichling no. 418.
29 It should be noted that the text as given in Therstappen's edition in Das Chor-
werk contains a considerable number of errors that are found in none of the sources
mentioned in this study. These errors were noted by Alfons Kurfess, who in "Si-
byllarum carmina chromatico tenore modulata," Aevum, XXVI (1952), pp. 485-94,
suggested emendations, many of which were in accordance with the sources even
though he was not acquainted with them. Kurfess also commented sharply on the
ineptness of Therstappen's German translation.
30 Barbieri, Quattuor opuscula (Oppenheim, [c. I51o]), Hain-Coppinger 2454;
Barbieri, Opusculum de vaticiniis sibillarum (Oppenheim, [c. I5'14).
31 The 153 I edition appears in facsimile in Albert Ritter, ed., Collectio vaticiniorum
(Berlin, 1923). The dates given are all those before 1545 listed by Ritter, the National
Union Catalog, and the British Museum Catalog of Printed Books.
bieri's treatise did not reappear after 1514 in its

poems surfaced again, they were in a quite diffe
The publications of the late fifteenth and early
dealt with sibyls were several degrees removed f
Christian pseudo-Oracula sibyllina, which wer
centuries, as mentioned above. A manuscript o
covered in the sixteenth century, however, and
ed by Xystus Betuleius (Sixt Birken) was prin
Basel in 1545. At the end of this book, follow
from the editor, the printer added a further not
his erudite friend Gilbert Cousin gave him some
he had recently found in an old book (presumabl
its later printings), which are added here as a
last four pages the twelve poems of Lasso's Proph
ends with its colophon.33 A Latin translation
Castellion (Chateillon) followed in 1546 from the
twelve poems.34 In 1555, after the death of Bi
rinus's publication of a revised bilingual edition o
of the Oracula, with the two languages on facing
were again added, on pages 291-4, with the same
rum de Christo vaticinia (Prophecies of Christ by
and 1555 editions the order of the poems in the
tained, which is identical to that of Lasso exce
last two poems, "Erythraea" and "Agrippa" (s
probably made by Lasso because "Agrippa" end
a doxology, more conclusively than "Erythrae
performed in the order "Agrippa-Erythraea", th
the poems, since the former ends in a full ca
cadence in the sixth mode.3 The three-line pro
or for Lasso; it does not appear in any print o
32 Oracula sibyllina, ed. Sixt Birken (Basel, 1545)

cusque opusculo, oblati nobis sunt a D. Gilberto Co
nostro singulari, diversarum Sibyllarum carmina aliq
et ex vetustissimo codice descripta, quae hic subiicere
bert Cousin or Cognatus (I5o6-c. 1570) was a huma
some time secretary to Erasmus, and had a long asso
many of his writings were published there by Opori
33 Andrd Pirro, Histoire de la musique de lafin du
1940), p. 342, noted this publication of the poems, a
escaped Boetticher's notice. I am indebted to Dr. Rein
my attention.
34 Castellion was a prominent associate of Calvin for a time, but broke with him
on doctrinal grounds; his numerous literary works include a somewhat heterodox
translation of the Bible.
35 On the modality of the Prophetiae, see Bernhard Neier, Die Tonarten der klassi-
schen Vokalpolyphonie (Utrecht, 1974), P- 452.
The poems as they appear in 1545 and 1555 reproduce the text essentially
as it had been printed earlier except for spelling and punctuation. The later
editions are preferable, since their punctuation makes better sense of the
texts. It may be presumed that Cousin edited the poems for their 1545 ap-
pearance; the 1555 version differs only minimally. These two versions and
the versions of Lasso's partbooks are collated in the text of the poems as given
in the Appendix, where an English translation is also provided.
It should be noted that the poems are not translations of any part of the
pseudo-Oracula sibyllina, despite assertions to the contrary by some recent
writers. Indeed, had they been such, their separate appearance in the 1555
edition would have been redundant after the complete Latin translation of
the Oracula. The poems of course were published some forty years before the
Oracula, so any direct dependence on the latter is highly unlikely, although it
is remotely possible that their author might have had access to a manuscript
of the Oracula in the original Greek. The 1545 edition of the Oracula suggests
that the poems are translated into Latin (see n. 32 above), but present evi-
dence makes this assertion implausible. The poems are in the spirit of the
Oracula but are not extracted from them.
The question of course arises, which if any of the printed versions of the
poems was Lasso's source? Comparison of Lasso's manuscript with the print-
ed versions does not yield an unequivocal answer, but the following may be
noted:
I. The words of the poems are almost identical in all sources; one of the few dif-
ferences is in poem VIII, line 3, where the early prints have complerant, while the two
later prints and Lasso have complerent.
2. Punctuation differs substantially between the later and earlier prints, but Lasso
included almost no punctuation at all in any partbook, so this tells us very little.
3. Nowhere does Lasso's text agree with the early prints and disagree at the same
time with the later ones.
4. Two instances of disagreement among the partbooks themselves (IV, 2, and VIII,
6) are probably due to careless copying.
5. The added syllable in X, 4 ("Bethlemitica" rather than "Bethlemica") was evi-

dently the doing of Lasso or someone who may have copied the poems for him from a
book (his access to the poems could have been at second hand rather than direct from a
printed source). The added syllable destroys the scansion but cannot be omitted from
Lasso's setting.
6. Lasso's cadences are never placed so as to ignore or contradict major punctuation

marks in the two later prints. Not every comma receives a cadence, and a few ca-
dences occur at syntactically logical points where one or both editions do not punc-
tuate, but Lasso clearly understood the sense of the text in the same way as it ap-
peared in the 1545 and 1555 prints.
The texts themselves thus indicate that Lasso found the poems in either the
1545 and 1555 printing, and it is indeed more likely that he would have found
them in a recent publication than in one forty or more years old.
As to the choice between the 1545 and 1555 prints, the texts themselves
STUDIES AND REPORTS 5 3 1
are not conclusive, nor is any external eviden

favor the 1555 print, which is dated in Augus
when Lasso settled in Antwerp. The fact that all
the very first were northern argues strongly th
the north, as does the northern tradition represe
In that case, Lasso's return north and the 1555 pu
make the latter the most probable source, sinc
been more than ten years old, and the more rece
have been more available. Lasso could have enc
werp before his employment in Munich bega
Leuchtmann's argument noted above in favor
seems decisive on that score. In sum, it is not im
composed in Italy and the poems taken there fro
earlier one, but the probabilities are all in favor
Alps, most likely in Munich between 1557 and
the source of the poems.
Lasso and Mielich clearly collaborated on the m
combined two distinct traditions about the sibyls
knowledge the only place where the iconographic
and the poems from Italy appear together. This i
tions really intermingle: the poems have little if
rial symbols, and the latter are of course distort
which followed that of the poems.37 These incon
ened by the presence in the manuscript of the Le
very different in subject and style from the Prop
less, the manuscript is a remarkable expression th
of artistic and literary traditions which extended
and Mielich, which were especially vigorous in th
composition, and which Lasso and Mielich brou
their patron.
APPENDIX
(pp. 532-7; Notes, p. 538)
36 Leuchtmann, I, pp. 99-107, determines that n

presence in Munich before 1557, and he thus rejec
Sandberger, Boetticher and others that Lasso's emp
37 Examination of depictions of the sibyls betwee
might establish whether the change in order occurs
script, but such an inquiry is beyond the scope of th
38 In the manuscript the Job motets are decorated
tials, but have no miniatures.
Carmina chromatico quae audis modulata tenore,

Haec sunt illa quibus nostrae olim arcana salutis
Bis senae intrepido cecinerunt ore Sibyllae.
I. PERSICA.
Virgine matre satus, pando residebit asello,

lucundus princeps, unus qui ferre salutem
Rite queat lapsis: tamen illis forte diebus
Multi multa ferent, immensi fata laboris.
Solo sed satis est oracula prodere verbo:
Ille Deus casta nascetur virgine magnus.
II. LIBYCA.
Ecce dies venient, quo aeternus tempore princeps,

Irradians sata laeta, viris sua crimina tollet,
Lumine clarescet cuius synagoga recenti:
Sordida qui solus reserabit labra reorum,
Aequus erit cunctis, gremio rex membra reclinet
Reginae mundi, sanctus, per saecula vivus.
III. DELPHICA.
Non tarde veniet, tacita sed mente tenendum

Hoc opus. hoc memori semper qui corde reponet,
Huius pertentant cur gaudia magna prophetae
Eximii, qui virginea conceptus ab alvo
Prodibit, sine contactu maris. omnia vincit
Hoc naturae opera: at fecit, qui cuncta gubernat.
IV. CIMMERIA.
In teneris annis facie praesignis, honore

Militiae aeternae regem sacra virgo cibabit
Lacte suo: per quem gaudebunt pectore summo
Omnia, et Eoo lucebit sidus ab orbe
Mirificum: sua dona Magi cum laude ferentes,
Obiicient puero myrrham, aurum, thura Sabaea.
Polyphonic songs which you hear with a chro

these are they, in which our twice-six sibyls
sang with fearless mouth the secrets of salvatio
I. PERSICA.
The son of a virgin mother shall sit on a crook-backed ass,

the joyful prince, the only one who can rightly bring
salvation to the fallen; but it will happen in those days that
many shall tell many prophecies of great labor.
But it is enough for the oracles to bring forth with a single word:
That great God shall be born of a chaste virgin.
II. LIBYCA
Behold the days will come, at which time the immortal prince,
sowing abundant crops, shall take away their crimes from men,
whose synagogue will shine with new light;
he alone shall open the soiled lips of the accused,
he shall be just to all; let the king, holy, living for all ages,
recline his limbs in the bosom of the queen of the world.
III. DELPHICA.
He shall not come slowly (but this work must be held with
quiet thought), he who will ever store this in a mindful heart,
why his prophets may announce great joys of this
exalted one, who shall come forth conceived from the
virginal womb without taint of man. This conquers all
the works of nature: yet he has done this who governs all things.
IV. CIMMERIA.
In her tender years, distinguished with beauty, in honor

the holy virgin will feed the king of the eternal host
with her milk; through whom all things will rejoice
with uplifted heart, and in the east will shine
a marvelous star: Magi bringing their gifts with praise
shall present to the child myrrh, gold, Sabaean frankincense.
V. SAMIA.
Ecce dies, nigras quae toilet laeta tenebras,

Mox veniet, solvens nodosa volumina vatum
Gentis Judaeae, referent ut carmina plebis.
Hunc poterunt clarum vivorum tangere regem,
Humano quem virgo sinu inviolata fovebit.
Annuit hoc coelum, rutilantia sidera monstrant.
VI. CUMANA.
Iam mea certa manent, et vera, novissima verba,

Ultima venturi qu6d erant oracula regis,
Qui toti veniens mundo cum pace, placebit,
Ut voluit, nostra vestitus carne decenter,
In cunctis humilis. castam pro matre puellam
Deliget, haec alias forma praecesserit omnes.
VII. HELLESPONTICA.
Dum meditor quondam vidi decorare puellam,

Eximio (castam quod se servaret) honore,
Munere digna suo, et divino numine visa,
Quae sobolem multo pareret splendore micantem:
Progenies summi, speciosa et vera Tonantis,
Pacifica mundum qui sub ditione gubernet.
VIII. PHRYGIA.
Ipsa Deum vidi summum, punire volentem

Mundi homines stupidos, et pectora caeca, rebellis.
Et quia sic nostram complerent crimina pellem,
Virginis in corpus voluit demittere coelo
Ipse Deus prolem, quam nunciet Angelus almae
Matri, quo miseros contracta sorde levaret.
IX. EUROPAEA.
Virginis aeternum veniet de corpore verbum

Purum, qui valles et montes transiet altos.
Ille volens etiam stellato missus Olympo,
Edetur mundo pauper, qui cuncta silenti
Rexerit imperio: sic credo, et mente fatebor:
Humano simul ac divino semine gnatus.
V. SAMIA.
Behold, the joyful day which shall lift the black darkness
will soon come and unravel the knotty writings of the prophets
of the Judean tribe, as the people's songs tell.
They shall be able to touch this glorious ruler of the living,
whom an unstained virgin will nurture at a human breast.
This the heavens promise, this the glowing stars show.
VI. CUMANA.
Now my most recent words shall remain certain and true,

because they were the last oracles of the king to come,
Who, coming for the whole world with peace, shall be pleased,
as he intended, to be clothed fitly in our flesh,
humble in all things. He shall choose a chaste maiden for his
mother; she shall exceed all others in beauty.
VII. HELLESPONTICA.
Once while I was reflecting, I saw him adorn a maiden

with great honor (because she kept herself chaste);
She seemed worthy through his gift and divine authority
to give birth to a glorious offspring with great splendor:
the beautiful and true child of the highest Thunderer,
who would rule the world with peaceful authority.
VIII. PHRYGIA.
I myself saw the high God wishing to punish

the stupid men of the earth and the blind heart of the rebel.
And because crimes shall thus fill our skin,
God himself wished to send from heaven into the body
of a virgin his son, which the angel shall announce to the fostering
mother, so that he may raise the wretches from the uncleanness
contracted.
IX. EUROPAEA.
From the body of a virgin shall come forth the pure

word eternal, who shall cross valleys and high mountains.
He, willingly sent even from starry Olympus,
will be sent into the world a pauper, who shall rule all creation
with silent power. Thus I believe and shall acknowledge in my
He is the child of both divine and human seed.
X. TYBURTINA.
Verax ipse Deus dedit haec mihi munia fandi,

Carmine qu6d sanctam potui monstrare puellam,
Concipiet quae Nazareis in finibus, illum
Quem sub came Deum Bethlemica rura videbunt.
O nimium felix, coelo dignissima mater,
Quae tantam sacro lactabit ab ubere prolem.
XI. ERYTHRAEA.
Cerno Dei natum, qui se demisit ab alto,

Ultima felices referent cum tempora soles:
Hebraea quem virgo feret de stirpe decora,
In terris multum teneris passurus ab annis,
Magnus erit tamen hic divino carmine vates,
Virgine matre satus, prudenti pectore verax.
XII. AGRIPPA.
Summus erit sub came satus, charissimus atque,

Virginis et verae complebit viscera sanctum
Verbum, consilio, sine noxa, spiritus almi:
Despectus multis tamen ille, salutis amore,
Arguet et nostra commissa piacula culpa:
Cuius honos constans, et gloria certa manebit.
X. TYBURTINA.
The truthful God himself gave me these gifts of prophecy,

that I might proclaim in song the holy virgin
who shall conceive in Nazareth's bounds
that God whom Bethlehem's lands shall see in the flesh.
O most happy mother, worthy of Heaven,
who shall nurse such a child from her holy breast.
XI. ERYTHRAEA.
I behold the son of God, who sent himself from on high,

when the joyful days shall bring the last times.
He whom the comely virgin shall bear from the Hebrew lineage,
he who shall suffer much on earth from his tender years on,
he shall nevertheless be here a great seer in godly prophecy,
the son of a virgin mother, truthful and of a wise heart.
XII. AGRIPPA.
The highest and dearest shall be born in the flesh the son
of the true virgin, and the holy word shall fill the womb
of the maiden through the pure intention of the nurturing spirit;
although contemptible to many, he, for love of our salvation,
will censure the sins committed by our guilt;
his honor shall remain constant and his glory certain.
NOTES TO THE APPENDIX
The Appendix gives the Latin texts of the twelve poems, generally fol-
lowing 1555 (for source abbreviations see Table I above, p. 524) but collating
1545 and z56o. The three-line prologue, written by or for Lasso, is taken
from 156o. The order of the last two poems follows z56o rather than 5555;
the poems are numbered only in i6oo. The translations are by Peter Berg-
quist, and attempt to convey as exactly as possible the sense of each line.
Emendations
passim v for u, i forj

III: 3 cur: cor in all sources. (See Alfons Kurfess, "Sibyllarum carmina
chromatico tenore modulata," Aevum, XXVI (1952), p. 486,
where this emendation is proposed.)
Variant readings
1:4 no comma (1545) VII:I quondam, (1545)

11:3 sinagoga (i56o) VIII:5 alma (i56o)
IV:2 regem, (545) VIII:6 lavaret (z56o, bass)
IV:2 cibavit (z56o, tenor) IX:5 rex erit (i555)
IV:4 eoo (z545) IX:6 natus (156o)
IV:6 puero, (1545) X:4 Bethlemitica (156o)
V:6 sydera (i56o) XI:2 foelices (z545)
VI:3 mundo, ('545)
Critical commentary
IX:2 Qui takes verbum as its antecedent, though gender does not agree: see
Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short, A Latin Dictionary (Oxford,
1879 and reprints), p. 151o s.v. qui, II, A, 4.
XII:3 Spiritus scans as nominative, though its sense is genitive.
University of Oregon
The assistance of a research grant from the University of Oregon in the preparation of
this study is gratefully acknowledged. I wish also to thank the staffs of the Henry
Huntington Library, San Marino, California, and the Folger Shakespeare Library,
Washington, D.C., for their cordial and courteous assistance when I visited their
collections. Film and information supplied by the Oesterreichisches National-
bibliothek, Vienna, the Library of Congress, the Beinecke Rare Book Library of Yale
University, and the Newberry Library, Chicago, are also gratefully acknowledged.

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The Poems of Orlando Di Lasso's "Prophetiae Sibyllarum" and Their Sources - Peter Bergquist

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Author(s): Peter Bergquist

American Musicological Society, University of California Press are collaborating with

The Poems of Orlando di Lasso's

O RLANDO DI LASSO'S Prophetiae Sibyllarum (Sibylline Prophecies) is a cycle of

3Horst Leuchtmann, Orlando di Lasso (Wiesbaden, 1976), I, pp. 124-5, n. 144,

suggests that Lasso may even have been present

12 Sandberger, "Vorwort" to Orlando di Lasso, Sd

In his Divinae institutiones, Book I, chapter 6 (about 30

bieri'9 (Philippus de Barberiis, born about 142

19 Rome: [Johannes Philippus de Lignamine], I D

23 Arthur M. Hind, An Introduction to a History of Woodcut (New York, 1963; re-

Sibyl Age Symbol Mea

continues through the Annunciation, Birth, Flig

Barbieri's treatise seems to have been assembled without knowledge of

bieri's treatise did not reappear after 1514 in its

32 Oracula sibyllina, ed. Sixt Birken (Basel, 1545)

5. The added syllable in X, 4 ("Bethlemitica" rather than "Bethlemica") was evi-

6. Lasso's cadences are never placed so as to ignore or contradict major punctuation

are not conclusive, nor is any external eviden

(pp. 532-7; Notes, p. 538)

36 Leuchtmann, I, pp. 99-107, determines that n

Carmina chromatico quae audis modulata tenore,

Virgine matre satus, pando residebit asello,

Ecce dies venient, quo aeternus tempore princeps,

Non tarde veniet, tacita sed mente tenendum

In teneris annis facie praesignis, honore

Polyphonic songs which you hear with a chro

The son of a virgin mother shall sit on a crook-backed ass,

In her tender years, distinguished with beauty, in honor

Ecce dies, nigras quae toilet laeta tenebras,

Iam mea certa manent, et vera, novissima verba,

Dum meditor quondam vidi decorare puellam,

Ipsa Deum vidi summum, punire volentem

Virginis aeternum veniet de corpore verbum

Now my most recent words shall remain certain and true,

Once while I was reflecting, I saw him adorn a maiden

I myself saw the high God wishing to punish

From the body of a virgin shall come forth the pure

Verax ipse Deus dedit haec mihi munia fandi,

Cerno Dei natum, qui se demisit ab alto,

Summus erit sub came satus, charissimus atque,

The truthful God himself gave me these gifts of prophecy,

I behold the son of God, who sent himself from on high,

passim v for u, i forj

1:4 no comma (1545) VII:I quondam, (1545)

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