The Soundscape of Early Medieval Europe

In the early medieval world, long before Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, human voices echoed simple and raw. Melodies that would eventually shape the entire future of western classical music. What did the music sound like after the fall of Roman Empire? Before symphonies? Before harmony? Before even modern notation existed? Stay with me until the end of this video as we discover the music in the early medieval era. Before we begin, I would like to ask you to subscribe to this channel, like this video and leave your comments in the comment section below. Now, let's get back to the topic. In order to understand the music of the early medieval era better, we need to understand what it means when we talk about medieval era. The medieval era roughly spans from 476 CE to around 1500 CE. This long historical period is generally divided into three sections. Early medieval era roughly spans from 500 to 1000 CE. High medieval era roughly spans from 1000 to 1300 CE. And late medieval era roughly spans from 1300 to 1500 CE. For the sake of simplicity, I would like to review the music of each era associated with these dates. So, when we talk about the early medieval era, we are talking about 500 CE to 1000 CE. To better understand the musical atmosphere of the medieval era, we need to understand what happened to the Roman Empire itself. The Roman Empire was officially divided into two parts in 395 CE after the death of the emperor Theodorus I. The Western Empire and the Byzantine Empire or Eastern Roman Empire are the subdivisions. The Western half gradually weakened due to political instability, economic decline, internal instabilities, military pressure and repeated invasions by the various Germanic tribes such as Visigoths and Vandals. Finally in 476 CE, after the Romulus Augustus was removed from the power, the Roman Empire fell. This event traditionally marks the beginning of the medieval era. In the 6th century, various Germanic kingdoms had emerged, including Franks, the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths across much of the Western Europe. During the 6th century, many of these ruling elites increasingly converted to Christianity. At the same time, regional rulers and local powers became increasingly influential due to the decayed Roman infrastructure. Compared to the unified Roman world, Western Europe became more fragmented, village-based and decentralized, an atmosphere that would deeply influence the development of early medieval era music. In the 6th century, one of the most important musical developments in Western Europe was the growing tradition of plain chants. As Christianity became increasingly influential, chanting became a central part of the religious and communal life. These chants, that are referred to as plain chants, were primarily vocal and monophonic, meaning they consisted of a single melody line, sung together without any harmony or instrumental accompaniment. The chants of this period were not yet standardized across Europe. Different regions developed their own chant traditions and liturgical practices. What we later call Gregorian chant had not yet fully formed in the 6th century, though earlier chant traditions were gradually laying the foundation for it. Musically, these chants were calm, flowing and had a speech-like quality without any particular rhythmic pulse. And since the notation back then was extremely limited, these notations were transmitted through oral traditions from the teacher to the student. In the 7th century, Europe remained fragmented and Germanic kingdoms kept ruling. Christianity became more influential in this century. At the same time, due to lack of a central power, regional rulers and local powers became more and more influential. Plain chants in this period continued becoming more central to the traditions of Western Europe. Different regions had their own chant traditions. Music was still transmitted orally through memory and repetition, rather than written notation. Pope Gregory I helped with organizing these chants. The name Gregorian in the Gregorian chants come from the Pope Gregory I who lived in the 6th and 7th century. Medieval tradition later associated him with organizing chants but not composing them. In the 8th century, somewhere around 711 CE, the Umayyad Caliphate crossed into Europe through Iberian Peninsula. Much of the modern-day Portugal, Spain and Southern France became under their rule. Up until 1492, the Iberian Peninsula became a meeting point of different cultures, religions, knowledge and artistic traditions, an atmosphere that would later influence many aspects of European music. At roughly the same time, a new power was rising in Western Europe. Between 768 and 814 CE, Charlemagne gradually united large parts of Western and Central Europe through military conquest, political organization and religious alliance. His Rome became known as Carolingian Empire in 800 CE. In the year 800 CE, Charlemagne was crowned Emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III. To many people of the time, this symbolized the rebirth of imperial authority in Western Europe after centuries of instability following to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire. The Carolingian Empire soon became very important, not only politically but also culturally. Many important efforts towards music education and manuscription happened during this era throughout Europe. Under the Carolingian Reforms, there was a growing effort to standardize liturgical chant throughout the empire. Roman chant traditions were promoted and gradually blended with local Frankish traditions, continuing to what would later become known as Gregorian chant. Charlemagne also encouraged music education, manuscript production, monasteries and cathedral schools became increasingly important centers for teaching chant and preserving musical traditions. One of the most important musical developments associated with this era is the pneumatic notation or neumes. As Carolingians tried to make the chants more consistent throughout the empire, they needed better ways to preserve and communicate these chants and that's why neumes started to appear. Early neumes were simple, they were appearing above the texts as simple symbols showing the general movement of melodies. They did not yet indicate the exact pitches or rhythms, but they became one of the earliest foundations of Western musical notation. In the 9th century, Europe was still deeply shaped by the legacy of the Carolingian empire, created by Charlemagne. Although this empire had briefly brought greater political power unity to large parts of Western and Central Europe, maintaining that unity proved difficult after his death in 814 CE. Eventually, the empire was divided into East, West and Middle among Charlemagne's grandsons through the Treaty of Verdun in 843 CE. The Middle Kingdom however only lasted about 12 years before it was divided into East and Western Kingdom. At the same time, Europe was under invasion from three sides. Vikings from the North, Magyar invasions from the East and raids connected to the powers of North Africa and Al-Andalos from the South. These invasions created a great deal of instability across Europe and as a result, local powers became more and more responsible for control and defense of these smaller regions. This could be referred to as feudalism and although it started in the 7th century, these instabilities established it further. As a result of feudalism, political power became more localized and decentralized. Castles, regional lordships and local alliances gradually became more important in medieval society. In the 9th century, Plainchance continued to dominate much of the musical life of Western Europe and they became increasingly organized and standardized across parts of the former Carolingian world. The growing use of pneums helped to preserve melodies more consistently. The 9th century is also very important for the emergence of the documented polyphony. Polyphony is when more than one melody line is happening at the same time. One of the earliest forms of the polyphony is called organum, which is basically a fixed interval such as fourth or fifth accompanying the main chant melody. Although these early experiments were relatively simple, they represented a multiple voices sounding together simultaneously. From these beginnings, the foundations of the later counterpoint and harmony were laid. In the 10th century, much of the Western Europe was still politically fragmented after the decline and division of the Carolingian empire. Local rulers, nobles and regional lords continued gaining influence while centralized authority remained relatively weak across many parts of Europe. During the 10th century, feudalism established itself more deeply and towards the end of the century we have more political stability as the Vikings and Magyar invasions slowed. One of the most important developments of this century was the rise of Otto I. Starting as a king of East Francia in 936 CE, he gradually consolidated power across parts of Central Europe through military victories and political alliances. In 962 CE, Otto I was crowned emperor in Rome by the Pope. In the 10th century, plain chants were still widespread across Europe. Neumes in the 10th century became more organized and more commonly used in manuscripts, helping to preserve chants more consistently across different regions. For many of us, the Western classical music starts with figures like Handel, Vivaldi, Bach. But long before the symphony halls and opera houses, there existed a completely different musical world. Centuries of political collapse, invasion, fragmentation and transformation after the fall of the Western Roman Empire did not stop humans musically. The chants of the early medieval world may sound simple to modern ears, yet within them lay some of the deepest foundations of the Western classical music. Some of them being the preservation of melody, the emergence of notation, the gradual organization of musical systems and the first fragile experiments with polyphony. From these distant experiments, there appears the large body works of the medieval polyphony, Renaissance counterpoint, Baroque music and everything else that followed in the Western classical music. At this point, I would like to conclude the video and I would like to thank you for watching the video until the end. Please share your thoughts in the comment section below. Thank you!