Cantigas de Santa Maria Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
The Cantigas de Santa Maria -i.e.: Virgin Mary Songs- manuscripts were written in Galician-Portuguese during the reign of Alfonso X El Sabio (1221-1284) and are one of the largest collections of monophonic (solo) songs from the middle ages. All of the songs at least mention the Virgin Mary, and every 10th is a religious hymn. Some of the manuscripts containing this music also contain color illuminations of pairs of musicians, playing a wide variety of instruments.The Cantigas are written in Galician-Portuguese, the literary language of Castile at the time. A complete transcription is available, as is a recent English translation.
The Cantigas are composed of 420 poems, 356 of them are narrative ones, relates of Virgin Mary miracles; the rest of them, except an introduction and two prologs, are of loor or referred to Marian festivities.
The authors are unknown, even if several studies indicate that Airas Nunes - Galician poet- might well have been the writer of a big part of them. The King Alfonso X -named himself as Affonso in the Cantigas- is also believed as writer of some of them in which he refers himself in first person.
The metrics are extraordinarily diverse: 280 different formats for the 420 Cantigas. The most common are the virelai and the rondeau. The length of the verses varies between two and 24 syllabes.
The music is written in notation which is similar to the notation used for chant, but also contains some information about the length of the notes. Several transcriptions exist. The Cantigas are frequently recorded and performed by Early Music groups, and quite a few CDs featuring music from the Cantigas are available.
Three codices (copies) of the Cantigas are preserved.
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