Beatam me dicent

Beatam me dicent omnes generationes, quia fecit mihi magna qui potens est.

All generations shall call me blessed, for He who is mighty has done great things for me.

Luke 1:48b-49a

This short chant, setting only a couple lines of the Magnificat, leaves behind perplexing questions. The text originally corresponds to the Matins responsory for the feast of the Assumption, as seen by the 22 textual results in the Cantus Database¹. Of these results, Hartker’s Antiphonary, dating from the end of the eleventh century, is one of the most compelling pieces of evidence suggesting that the text predates the melody². The communion text is slightly abridged from the Matins setting and omits the final tag from Luke 1:49. The later compositional date of the melody is evinced by its patchwork nature. Something like centonization occurred in the creation of the melody, which is verbatim copied from pre-existing mode VI communion chants. Melodic-textual selections are as follows: beatam me dicent from Panem de caelo, E 324³, omnes from Honora Dominum, E 322⁴, generationes quia fecit mihi magna qui potens est from Ecce Dominus veniet, E 14⁵. The standard cadental tritus formula is found over potens est. With so much melodic borrowing, the possibility of a mode VI communion melody-type cannot be ruled out. How and when was the text abbreviated from the responsory text and reworked into a mode VI communion chant in the Mass? What was the process of macro-structure centonization like? 

After I transcribed the relevant neumes, I checked my reconstruction with Anton Stingl’s edition⁶. On dicent, I added a virga with an episema to emphasize the modal tension between SOL and FA and to slow down through the mediant cadence. Stingl’s transcription from the entirely light pes subbipunctis, as given in the other chant, to one that emphasizes the last two notes on the word omnes makes sense contextually. This elongation serves a similar purpose to that over dicent and allows the complex articulation between the “m” and “n” of omnes to be articulated adequately. Thus, I decided to adopt his idea. The textual-melodic division can be broken into two sections: beatam me dicent omnes generationes and quia fecit mihi magna qui potens est. Although the TE on generationes acts as a fulcrum that draws the melody to the dominant, LA, the chant ultimately reaches its apex on mihi. As a plagal mode, this surprising peak echoes Mary’s cry of utter astonishment (“He who is mighty has done great things for me). 

1. “Search Beatam me dicent omnes generationes quia fecit mihi on Cantus.org,” Cantus, accessed August 15, 2024, https://cantusdatabase.org/chant-search/?op=starts_with&keyword=Beatam+me+dicent+omnes+generationes+quia+fecit+mihi&office=&genre=&cantus_id=&mode=&feast=&position=&melodies=
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2. “SG 390”, e-codicies, swissuniversities, accessed August 15, 2024, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/csg/0391/103
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3. Ibid, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/sbe/0121/324 ↩︎
4. Ibid, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/sbe/0121/322
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5. Ibid, https://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/sbe/0121/14
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6. Stingl, Anton, “Aufnahme Mariens”, July 2023, accessed August 15, 2024, http://www.gregor-und-taube.de/Materialien/Graduale/G.08-15-Aufnahme-Mariens.pdf
   
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