Summary
Stathis Gregorios, Sinai and the sinaitic music manuscripts.
This paper consists of two parts. The first part includes characteristic pages taken from my diary "Sinaitic Memoir" of certain dates between January and June of 1967, a period during which my humility resided in the monastery of Saint Catherine of Sinai. These pages refer to lyrcal and other descriptions, as Ι experienced them at the time. The second part, in 6 paragraphs, attempts a systematic approach and presentation of the manuscripts of the Psaltic Art, i.e., Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Music, that are kept in the monastery library. The paragraphs, in particular, treat the following subjects: a) Nomenclature of the musical manuscripts. -b) Classification of these manuscripts, -c) Chronological sequence. -d) Origin. -e) Importance of the Sinaϊtic musical manuscripts. -and f) The Sinaite composers. Research has found that the 350 musical manuscripts of Sinai cover all the spectrum of variety in terms of melurgy, and constitute a remarkable independent monastery collection of musical manuscripts. The Sinaϊtic Sticheraria, the Heirmologia, and the Papadikes of the period between the 10th and the 15th century are excellent. The codices of the post-Byzantine period are more than double the number of the Byzantine manuscripts. The manuscripts originate from many places, thanks to the activities of the Sinai Fathers who travelled to the whole of the Orthodox East. Many manuscripts come from Constantinople, Jerusalem, Cyprus, Crete, Moldovlachia, Russia, and Greece. Also a small number were wήtten at Sinai, in the monastery. There are also a great number of musical codices that bear a unique musicological importance, regarding issues of the semeiografia evolution, and many of them are signer by reknown melourgoi. Α special interest lies in a group of codices that deliver the so-called Cretan psaltic tradition. The codex number 1477 that Ι located in the unlisted codices collection, is of great importance, as in its 253 sheets it contains a great number of Byzantine and post-Byzantine compositions transcribed into the so-called "Kiev staff notation". This is the discovery of the 20th century for musicological research, as it allows, by making comparisons, the drawing of certain conclusions about the correct interpretation of the Byzantine semeiografia, and therefore the confirmation of the accuracy of the psalitc tradition, as it is preserved and now in actuality performed. Among many names of melourgoi from Sinai, two stand out for the importance of their work: Meletios Sinaϊtis from Veroia, "the Elder", around 1682, and Meletios Sinaϊtis psaltes from Chania "the younger", around 1775.
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