Timeline: Music of the Middle Ages

By dasha37
  • 476

    Collapse of Roman Empire

    The west half of the Roman Empire fell.
  • 590

    Gregory the Great Becomes Pope

  • Period: 717 to 718

    Siege of Constantinople

    Umayyad Caliphate sieges the Byzantine empire.
  • 800

    Charlemagne Declared King

    Frankish king who expanded Frankish empire.
  • Period: 990 to 1050

    Guido of Arezzo

    Developments in notation-- Guidonian notation with lines representing notes and clear pitches, and the Guidonian hand, and solmization using the first syllables of 'Ut quaent laxis.'
  • 1000

    Viderunt Omnes

    Anonymous, responsorial/gradual. Emphasizes certain words, very long chant.
    -Gregorian Chant
    -Lydian mode
    -Monophonic
    -Melismatic
    -Latin language [https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=TEQw2BufNj8]
  • 1000

    Christe Redemptor Omnium

    Anonymous, office hymn. Strophic form, longer melody.
    -Gregorian chant
    -Dorian mode
    -Monophonic
    -Syllabic
    -Latin language
  • 1000

    Tecum Principium

    Anonymous, office antiphon. No reciting tone.
    -Gregorian chant
    -Dorian mode
    -Monophonic
    -Syllabic
    -Latin language
  • 1000

    Dixit Dominus

    Anonymous, office/psalm tone.
    -Gregorian chant
    -Dorian mode
    -Monophonic
    -Syllabic
    -Latin language
  • 1054

    Great Schism

    Break between Roman Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church.
  • Period: 1135 to 1201

    Leoninus

    Composer of organum music in the Notre Dame school, musician and poet. Credited with Magnus Liber Organi
  • Period: 1140 to 1212

    Comtessa de Dia

    Trobairitz who composed 'A Chantar,' the only surviving trobairitz song set to music. Five of her works survive today. Was Occitanian.
  • Period: 1150 to 1200

    A Chantar

    Comtessa de Dia, troubadour song.
    -Monophonic
    -Syllabic
    -Occitan language
  • 1198

    Viderunt Omnes

    Perotin, Organum Quadruplum
    -Notre Dame school
    -Polyphonic
    -Melismatic
    -Latin language
  • Period: 1200 to 1300

    Factum est Salutare

    Anonymous, Motet. Discant style
    -Polyphonic
    -Syllabic
    -Latin language
  • 1215

    Declaration of Magna Carta

    First step to English constitutional government.
  • 1238

    Perotinus

    Poet-composer in the Notre Dame school. Expanded on Magnus Liber Organi, four-part music. Composed Viderunt Omnes as an organum piece.
  • 1250

    Sumer is Incumen est

    Anonymous, canon/rota. Six voices, pes.
    -English polyphony
    -Polyphonic
    -Syllabic
    -Latin and Old English translations
  • Period: 1300 to 1377

    Guillaume de Machaut

    Musician and poet in the Ars Nova. Wrote a mass ordinary, but also many secular motets. Over 140 of his works survive, which he collected in an illuminated manuscript, as well as portraits of himself. Worked at the Reims cathedral from 1340 until his death.
  • Period: 1315 to 1317

    Great Famine

    Bad weather and crop failure across Europe.
  • 1350

    Rose, Liz, Printemps, Verdure

    Guillame de Machaut, organum quadruplum, motet. Similar to courtly love in that nature is compared to a beautiful lady.