Adam of Saint Victor

Adam of Saint Victor (died 1146) was a prolific poet and composer of Latin hymns and sequences. He is believed to have sparked the expansion of the poetic and musical repertoire in the Notre Dame school with his strongly rhythmic and imagery-filled poetry.

The first reference to him is from 1098, in the archives of Notre Dame Cathedral, where he was first a subdeacon, and later a precentor. He left the cathedral for the Abbey of Saint Victor around 1133, probably because of his attempts at imposing the Rule of St Augustine at the cathedral.

Adam probably had contact with a number of important theologians, poets, and musicians of his day, including Peter Abelard and Hugh of St Victor, and he may have taught Albertus Parisiensis.

Thirty-seven of his hymns were published in the Elucidatorium Ecclesiasticum of Jodocus Clichtovaeus, a Catholic theologian of the 16th century. The remaining seventy hymns were preserved in the Abbey of Saint Victor until its dissolution during the French Revolution. They were then transferred to the Bibliothèque Nationale, where they were discovered by Léon Gautier, who edited the first complete edition of them (Paris, 1858).

References

• Margot E. Fassler. "Adam of St Victor", Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed May 20, 2006), grovemusic.com (subscription access).

Further Reading

• The liturgical poetry of Adam of St. Victor, with translations into English in the original metres, and short explanatory notes by Digby S. Wrangham, 3 vols, (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, 1881)

• Boyd Taylor Coolman and Dale M Coulter, eds, Trinity and creation: a selection of works of Hugh, Richard and Adam of St Victor. (Turnhout: Brepols, 2010) [includes translations of two of Adam of St. Victor’s sequences in praise of the Trinity]

• Hugh Feiss, ed, On love: a selection of works of Hugh, Adam, Achard, Richard and Godfrey of St Victor, (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011) [includes translation of Adam of St Victor, Sequences]