Allegorical Architecture in Scivias: Hildegard's Setting for the Ordo Virtutum.

Hildegard of Bingen's Ordo Virtutum has come to occupy a major role among Western European dramatic musical works, with scenes widely anthologized, multiple studies in print, and several recordings. I argue that the "setting" of Hildegard's Ordo Virtutum is the allegorical architecture created in her first major treatise, Scivias, written in the 1140s and early 1150s. In this period, while Hildegard was composing the play and writing her first major theological work, she was also designing a complex of new monastic buildings, which helps explain her concentration on architectural themes and images. Hildegard has situated the main "acts" of the play within allegorical towers, and the musical dimensions of the play are driven by its unfolding within this architectural understanding, including the "climbing" through the modes and the development of longer processional chants that link the action in one tower or pillar to that of another. We can see that the particular characters chosen for the play from a broad array of possibilities, underscore themes that relate to the lives and governance of Benedictine nuns. Hildegard's work provided parallels for her community between the allegorical architecture of Scivias, the play and its music, and the new church whose building was overseen by Hildegard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of the American Musicological Society is the property of University of California Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)