The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1917-01-27


will come away with the impression
that this cult goes back only to the
fifteenth century. Groves Dictionary
of Music and Musicians (new edition,
1904) would have us believe that the
period at which st. Cecilia was first
regarded asLthe tutelary saint of mu-
sic and musicians cannot safely be
sought for prior to the year 1902, and
that the whole subject is involved in
obscurity. Both Detzel and Pfeiderer
agree in the statement that none of
the early representations of st. Ce-
ella represent her with musical en-
blems, and they inform us that it is
only in the fifteenth century that at
tributes of a musical character are as
signed her in Christian art. The most
recent writer on the subject, DIR. Peter
Anton Kirsch, in his Die Heilige Gaze
ella, Jungfrau und Martyrin (1902),
has traced the cult to the middle of
the fourteenth century. He instances
an exquisite craving by Thomas v.
Mutina in the Church of Karlstein, in
Prague, dating from about the year
1910, representing ST. Cecilia with a
portative organ, and he also refers to
a beautiful statuette-of the fourteenth
century-now in the national museum
Florence, in which musical instru-
ments are associated with the saint.
Thus we can give undoubted testi-
mony to the cult of St. Cecilia as pa
troness of music in the first half of
the fourteenth century. A more re-
cent writer, R. E. Brandt, F. S. A., in
1908, was fortunate enough to discov-
er much earlier representation of
the saint in association with musical
instruments, which places the cult as
far back as 1920 or 1925. This dis
covery is an exquisite Statuette of st.
Cecilia in gilt copper, the provenance
of which is southern France, and she
is represented plucking the strings of
a four-stringed cythara-somewhat re-
sembling a rebec. Through the cour-
tesy of Arthur F. Hill, F. S. A., am
enabled to present the readers of the
Irish Rosary with a photograph of
this interesting statuette, which, as
Mr.. Prandt observes, would seem to
be the earliest known representation
of st. Cecilia with a musical instru-
ment as emblem" 1t may be well to
add that though the date of this stat
uette is from the first quarter of the
thirteenth century the form of the
cythara is somewhat similar to the
instrument played on by King David
as depicted in the Psalter of st. HUI
bert, French manuscript of the ninth
century. More remarkable still in the
latter manuscript the Royal Psalmist
is depicted as holding the cythara in
precisely the same manner and pluck
ing the strings. From which I con-
clude that the statuette-now in the
British museum-was modelled from a
ninth century figure, and thus it is
not unlikely that the association of
st. Cecilia with music was depicted
in Christian art Of that period. In
any case, as against the popular view
that the cult originated in the fifteenth
century, we have undoubted examples
of the early thirteenth and early four
teenth centuries, the authenticity Of
which cannot be gainsaid. Further,
be it noted that the we'll known ex-
amples of St. Cecilia by Van Dyck,
Raphael, Carlo, Do1ci and other mas
tiers merely perpetuate the immemo-
rial tradition of the saints connec-
ton with music.
The question naturally arises as to
the basis of the tradition associating
st. Cecilia with music And we can
unhesitatingly answer that the tradi-
ton is referred to in the following
passages from the Office of her feast:
"Cantantibus organis Cecilia in corde
suo soil Domino decantabat dicens;
fiat cor meum ct corpus meum i'm
maculatum, ut non confundar ('the
maiden Cecilia was wont with &C.
compartment of the organ to sing in
her heart to God alone, saying, keep
my heart and my body immaculate,
that may not be confounded").
Again, in the breviary compiled by