Music as Divine Order

It was largely through the work of the Roman statesman and educational reformer, Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius (c.480–c.524), that medieval musicians and scholars discovered Greek music and the philosophy associated with it. The presence at Queens’ of his treatise, ‘On the organization of Music’, in an edition acquired in the sixteenth century reflects the continuing role it enjoyed across Europe as a standard text for schools and universities. Assisted by Boethius’ mathematical view of music, medieval scholars and musicians inferred two interconnected ideas: that music mirrored the essential harmony of the cosmos and that it had a decisive influence on human health and behaviour (the doctrine of ethos). For Boethius audible music (musica instrumentalis) was merely a gross metaphor for the two higher forms of music: harmony of the human constitution (musica humana) and, most importantly, harmony of the cosmos (musica mundana). In Boethius’ view it was necessary to have mastered mathematical music in order to truly judge the work of a musician, whether composer or performer.

Author: Boethius
Title: De Institutione Musica in Opera omnia [Works] (Basel, 1570)
Shelfmark: F.1.24

F.1.24