A Short History of the Middle Ages Fourth Edition

Plate 7.6: The Motet S’Amours (c.1300). Like the composer of S’Amours, the artist of this page (painted
not long after the music itself was written) weaves together three separate stories. In the S of the word
“S’Amours,” which is sung by the disconsolate lover (the top voice), the artist presents, by contrast with
the text, two very contented lovers petting both animals and each other. To the right of this happy scene is
the initial A, the first letter of the word “Au,” which is sung by the victorious lover of the middle voice.
Again ironically, this figure is sad and lonely. By reversing the moods of the two voices with his pictures, is
the artist commenting on the fickleness of love? Beneath the “Ecce” of the third voice is a hunting scene,
complete with stag, hound, and hawk. The hunt was often used as a metaphor for amorous relations.

Complementing the motet’s complexity was the development of new schemes to

indicate rhythm. The most important, that of Franco of Cologne in his Art of

Measurable Song (c.1260), used different shapes to mark the number of beats for

which each note should be held. (See Figure 7.1; the music in Plate 7.6 uses a similar

rhythmic system.) Allowing for great flexibility and inventiveness in composition,

Franco’s scheme became the basis of modern musical notation.