Aquitaine is a region in the southwest of France,
Medieval (500–1400)
Chant and the Abbey of Saint Martial, Limoges
According to Grove Music Online, in the Middle Ages the Aquitaine region played a significant role in developing a unique and important repertory of medieval music which encompossed both monophonic and polyphonic music. The region is noted for its contribution to Gallican chant with Aquitanian chant manuscripts being an important group of documents in the study of that music. Some of the earliest surviving neumatic notations of Western plainsong are from the Aquitanian chant manuscripts from the 9th century. The vast majority of these manuscripts were from the Abbey of Saint Martial, Limoges (ASML) which housed the largest collection of mediaeval music in all of France. The monk, composer, and scribe Adémar de Chabannes was an influential figure in the building of the music library at the ASML.
The Aquitaine region also contributed to the development of a combined gradual and secular antiphoner during the late 9th and early 10th centuries. The Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) contains several tropers (a specific type of musical manuscript) from the ASML. One of these tropers, dated to , encompasses incipits of chants intended for use at Vespers and Matins. Another document from the ASML at the BnF is an abridged monastic antiphoner dated to the late 10th century which contains partial music notation. The library and archive at the Toledo Cathedral in Spain houses the earliest known fully notated manuscript from Aquitaine; an antiphoner dated to the early 11th century.
In the early 10th century a type of unique improperia known as the Aquitaine Reproaches emerged with representative manuscripts of this type extending from 903 through 1240 in the BnF. Aquitanian chant manuscripts from the early 12th century demonstrate a unique type of florid music developed within the organum literature. These include manuscripts of 94 two-part vocal pieces; half of which were based on older melodies and text, and the other half containing newly composed music and text. Only a small number of these pieces were liturgical with the others adopting a strophic form of trope known as versus. The polyphony demonstrated in these Aquitanian manuscripts is credited as a precursor to further polyphonic development in the Codex Calixtinus from the later part of the 12th century.
Troubadour and music of court and church patronage
William IX, Duke of Aquitaine (1071-1126) is considered the earliest known troubadour. Of his 11 surviving poems, only one survives with music: Pos de chantar m’es pres talens. His grandson was the English ruler Richard the Lionheart who also had a reputation as a singer and poet, and spent most of his life not in England but in Aquitaine. Richard's song Ja nus hons pris survives with music. Richard's mother and William's daughter, Eleanor of Aquitaine (1122–1204), financially supported several troubadours, including Bernart de Ventadorn.