Grand Master L'isle Adam's recycled liturgical manuscripts as notarial bindings

Abstract

This paper discusses the use of musical manuscript fragments that were once part of liturgical manuscripts commissioned by Grand Master L’Isle Adam (1521-1534) and are now used as binding material for sixteenth- and seventeenth-century notarial deeds. To date the Notarial Archives in St Christopher Street, Valletta, houses over one hundred manuscripts 1 that contain covers, spine linings, cover stiffeners or internal supports made from recycled musical manuscripts from different periods.2 A recent discovery by the author has shed new light on Grand Master L’Isle Adam’s commission for Malta. Until this discovery was made it was believed that L’Isle Adam had only commissioned for the Order the large illuminated graduals that are housed at St John’s Co-Cathedral. From comparative studies on musical fragments found at the Notarial Archives and at the National Museum of Fine Arts, Valletta, it appears that L’Isle Adam may have been involved in commissioning other liturgical manuscripts for the Order. However up until recently there has been no proof of this other than through stylistic evidence. From observations made on the binding of a notarial document dated 1582-1583,3 it has been revealed that the Grand Master had in fact ordered other liturgical manuscripts for the Order. This has curiously raised a series of questions about the extent of musical manuscript material that was available during the early years of the Order in Malta and the reasons for its subsequent recycling into a material for binding other manuscript volumes.