Oktōēchos (here transcribed "Octoechos"; Greek: , pronounced in Constantinopolitan: ;The female form exists as well, but means the book octoechos. from ὀκτώ "eight" and ἦχος "sound, mode" called echos; Slavonic: Осмогласие, Osmoglasie from о́смь "eight" and гласъ "voice, sound") is the name of the eight mode system used for the composition of religious chant in Byzantine, Syriac, Armenian, Georgian, Latin and Slavic churches since the Middle Ages. In a modified form the octoechos is still regarded as the foundation of the tradition of monodic Orthodox chant today.
Until 1204 neither the Hagia Sophia nor any other cathedral of the Byzantine Empire did abandon its habits, and the Hagiopolitan eight mode system came into use not earlier than in the mixed rite of Constantinople, after the patriarchate and the court had returned from their exile in Nikaia in 1261.
Middle Byzantine Round notation
In the history of the Byzantine rite the Hagiopolitan reform was described as a synthesis of the cathedral rite and the monastic rite.Stig S. R. Frøyshov (2007, p. 144). Nevertheless, the Hagiopolitan octoechos did not come into use at the Hagia Sophia of Constantinople before the Papadic reform during the late 13th and the 14th century, after the patriarchate and the court had returned from exile in Nicaea. The reform of John Koukouzeles can be studied by a new type of treatise called "Papadike" (ἡ παπαδικὴ).See the article "Papadikē" in the New Grove. It included a list of all neume signs which were taken from various chant books and their different notation systems. In the school of John Glykys this list had been organized as a didactic chant called Mega Ison which passed through all the eight echoi of the octoechos, while the singers memorize the signs and studied their effect in chant composition. This chant or exercise (μάθημα) had been invented by John Glykys, but most papadikai also add a second version in the redaction of John Koukouzeles who was probably his student.Nothing is known about John Glykys' (NGrove), except that had an office as protopsaltes and that he is represented as teacher of John Koukouzeles and Xenos Korones in a picture of the akolouthiai manuscript (see fig. 1 in Terzopoulos 2008 with the missing illumination of Mount Athos, Mone Koutloumousi, Ms. 475, fol. 1v). His students use cheironomic gestures for the neumes ison and oxeia, two of the first signs memorized in the Mega Ison (Alexandru 1996). These lists prefer the use of Byzantine round notation, which had developed during the late 12th century from the late diastematic Coislin type. The modal signatures were referred to the Hagiopolitan octoechos. Because the repertoire of signs was expanded under the influence of John Glykys' school, there was a scholarly discussion to make a distinction between Middle and Late Byzantine notation.Maria Alexandru (2000, pp. 15f) decided to abandon this distinction because of Christian Troelsgård's (2011, p. 28-29) argument that the often in red ink written signs marked rather stylistic differences (kalophonic compositions marked those signs in red which were taken from another book and its local tradition), but they did not change basic principles of notation. The discussion decided more or less against this distinction, because the Papadic school did not invent new neume signs, it rather integrated signs known from other chant books and their local traditions, including the books of the Constantinopolitan cathedral rite as they had been used until the Western conquest of Constantinople.
The mixed rite of Constantinople
The so-called mixed rite which replaced the former tradition of the cathedral rite, resembled in large parts the Divine Liturgy of John Chrysostom, of Basil of Caesarea, and of the Presanctified Gifts, as they are in use until today. But many places of the Byzantine Empire did never accept the reform of the Palaiologan Constantinople.In his essay "The Byzantine Office at Hagia Sophia" (1956) Oliver Strunk based his studies of the older cathedral rite on homiletic writings by Symeon, Metropolit of Thessaloniki, who still refused about 1400 the Constantinopolitan reform of the 1260s and who regarded the Thessalonian Hagia Sophia as the centre of the upright tradition of the Constantinopolitan cathedral rite. A similar conservative attitude can be found in Greek monasteries of Italy and Holy Mount Athos which never used the book of the reform "akolouthiai" (τάξις τῶν ἀκολουθίων "order of services"). Already during the early 13th century, when this tradition was expelled from Constantinople, the asmatika, psaltika, and kontakaria written in Italy, used Byzantine round notation and followed the synthesis of the Studite reform.
These local differences explain, why the erotapokriseis treatises already followed the Studite reform and represent somehow an early form of papadike,One of the earliest neume lists can be found in a 10th-century manuscript (Athos, Great Lavra Monastery, Ms. γ 67). so parts of it can later be found in the classical papadike manuscripts.Christian Troelsgård's and Maria Alexandru's contribution (2013) about the elements of the papadike offers a description of its parts and an overview of the various manuscripts and their contents (especially the many methods of different schools). The papadike itself had much in common with Latin tonaries. Intonation formulas and psalmody for the eight modes of the octoechos system can both be found in the book "akolouthiai"See the article "Akolouthiai" in the New Grove and the description (Harris 2001). One akolouthiai was recently digitised in Vienna (A-Wn Theol. gr. 185). and some sticheraria, and these late manuscripts are the only sources of Byzantine simple psalmody today. The new book akolouthiai replaced several books, the psaltikon, the asmatikon, the kontakarion, and the typikon, it puzzled the soloist's, the domestikos', and the choir's part, and the rubrics of the typikon together.See the kontakarion of the Bibliothèque nationale or the akolouthiai written in Thessaloniki (ca. 1400). It contained several little books as kratemataria (a collection of additional sections composed over abstract syllables), heirmologia, and embellished compositions of the polyeleos psalms.
But in this combination the papadike appears from the 14th century, while the earliest version introduced a sticherarion written in 1289.Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, fonds grec, ms. 261. This proves again the integrating role of the Middle Byzantine Round notation, which had developed as the notation of the book sticherarion since the 13th century.
Papadike
Despite longer theoretical explanations by authors like Gabriel Hieromonachos (Hannick & Wolfram 1985), Manuel Chrysaphes (Conomos 1985), Ioannis Plousiadinos which were usually attached to it, the Papadike itself was rather based on lists and exercises with short verbal explanations. The composition of the Papadike can be illustrated by the Italian manuscript of Messina (Messina, Biblioteca Regionale Universitaria, Fondo SS. Salvatore, Messan. gr. 154), which was edited and referred by Oskar Fleischer who dated it back to the 15th century.By the end of the 16th century is a more recent datation according to the current catalogue. Because the Papadike as introduction of the new book akolouthiai was regarded as very representative, this manuscript with its focus on John Glykys' method seems to be a copy of an earlier version. The manuscript which Fleischer had published from the reliefs of Friedrich Chrysander, is in fact a late copy of the 17th century which introduced the Anastasimatarion of Chrysaphes the New.Panagiotes the Protopsaltes (from about 1655 to 1682) used the pseudonym Χρυσάφης ὁ Νέος, because he transcribed the Anastasimatarion of Manuel Chrysaphes (an octoechos collection of stichera and troparia created by Palaiologan composers, used for the services of every Sunday and the cycle of 11 Matins Gospel).
The following schedule describes the content of the Papadike of the Codex Chrysander and explains the difference to earlier Papadikai: Protheoria beginning with Ἀρχὴ σὺν Θεῷ ἁγίῳ τῶν σημαδίων τῆς ψαλτικῆς τέχνης ("The beginning with the Holy God of the signs used in the psaltic art..."). The signs are described and listed starting with ἴσον and the other signs which sound, including tempo signs.Fleischer (1904, pp. 1-6). A list of the aphonic or "great signs" (Τὰ δὲ μεγάλα σημάδια).Fleischer (1904, pp. 6-8). A list between seven and nine phthorai (πρῶτος, δεύτερος, τρίτος, τέταρτος, πλάγιος πρώτου, νενανῶ, βαρέως ἤχου) and two signs for a change of the tone system (μεταβολή κατὰ σύστημα)—ἡμίφωνον and εἰμίφθορον (obviously needed for a change into the triphonic system of phthora nana). The system of diatonic phthorai developed during the 14th century and was described by Manuel Chrysaphes in 1458 (Conomos 1985, pp. 55-65).Fleischer (1904, p. 8). It allowed notators to find each echos on every note just by changing its pitch class, so the diatonic phthorai had been used to indicate the exact place, where a transposition (μεταβολή κατὰ τόνον) would take place. The octoechos, the modal signatures (marytyriai) of the different echoi, their octave species, and their name sung with the enechema.Fleischer (1904, pp. 8-10). A systematic list of all ascending and descending combinations used as phonic signs (σώματα and πνεύματα).Fleischer (1904, pp. 10-13). The following section is dedicated to the practice of parallage—a kind of solfeggio in which each phthongos ("pitch class") is recognized by an echos and its intonation (enechema).Oskar Fleischer (1904, pp. 13-19). The "methodos" is based on four columns which are also often organized in a circle. In this Papadike the circle form and the columns are illustrated by a parallage whose lines are shaped like a tree. Parallage is not the solfeggio as memorization of an existing melody (the latter called metrophonia is illustrated on page 16: ἡ κυρία μετροφωνία while the exercise has its own text, each step of the neumes is explained by the modal signature of its phthongos), but the exploration of the tone system by the use of the columns, circles, or its elaborated form as a tree. The seventh section is a collection of enechemata, which is very reduced in the 17th century redaction in comparison to earlier PapadikaiSee as example the lists of echemata in the manuscript quoted by the critical edition of the dialogue treatises (Hannick & Wolfram 1997) and Ms. grec. 495 (15th century) of the Public Library at St. Petersburg.—a troparion ἀνεβάς νεβὰν which memorizes always another echos with each verse, concludes the section.Fleischer (1904, pp. 20-23). It does not only document the simple forms as used in parallage, but also mesos intonations which were obviously needed to transcribe the whole repertoire including the cathedral rite into Byzantine round notation and its medial signatures which all refer to the Hagiopolitan octoechos.Oliver Strunk (1945) based his study of intonations and signatures on the lists given in Papadikai. This section proves the integrative use of this notation, its signatures and its phthorai, which made up the "Holy God of signs" and allowed him to recreate the different traditions of Eastern chant within the psaltic art and its notation.