Ross, MD; (2013) The Papal Chapel 1288–1303: A Study in Institutional and Cultural Change. Doctoral thesis , UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This project is a study of the structure and personnel of the papal chapel, and the administrative, governmental, legal and cultural activities of papal chaplains in the period 1288–1304. It is based on a new repertory of the collective biographies of papal chaplains compiled for this project, and comprises detailed analysis of this biographical repertory and of information on papal chaplains from the papal curia’s administrative and financial sources, new research concerning papal chaplains’ function in cardinals’ wills and as testators themselves, a comparison of the papal chapel with its contemporary counterpart at the English royal court – the chapel royal – and discussion of papal chaplains’ cultural activities and their role in the production of a curial court culture. It combines two broad approaches. On the one hand, it aims to clarify the administrative and economic structure of the papal chapel and establish the collective biographies of the papal chaplains themselves in the period 1288–1304. On the other, it uses this constitutional, economic and socio-demographic analysis as context for comparison with the English chapel royal and for discussion of the papal chapel’s cultural history in the same period. New information is brought to light on the role of the Roman schola cantorum in the papal chapel, on the history of honorary papal chaplains, on papal chaplains’ musical function, and on the differing course and impact of constitutional rationalisation in the papal chapel and English chapel royal. The contextualisation of cultural activity in the papal chapel with constitutional change shows the decisive importance for cultural history – especially for the papal chapel’s musical history – of dynamics originating outside the cultural domains.

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