by John Dygon
edited and translated by Theodor Dumitrescu
notes by Theodor Dumitrescu and Theodor Dumitrescu
University of Illinois Press, 2006
Cloth: 978-0-252-03182-3
Library of Congress Classification MT5.5.D94 2006
Dewey Decimal Classification 781.2

ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC
ABOUT THIS BOOK

A rare example of musical scholarship from the Tudor period, in translation and fully annotated


John Dygon was the prior of St. Augustine’s monastery in Canterbury when Henry VIII boldly dissolved the English Catholic Church during the 1530s and reorganized it under royal control. Only a single copy of Dygon’s manuscript on music theory has survived, held by Trinity College, Cambridge.  This volume will be the first publication of these two treatises, providing both a scholarly transcription and English translation.


Dygon’s treatise provides a rare and important example of musical scholarship from the early Tudor period, demonstrating the status of music education at the time, the affiliations of English scholarship with music study in Europe, and the music that was actually performed in England. The treatises address questions of musical notation, especially regarding rhythmic proportions, as well as practical issues about performance. Theodor Dumitrescu’s introduction situates Dygon’s treatises within the larger history of European music, paying close attention to its borrowings from and adaptations of prior treatises.