Holy Grail monk chant... help?
Matthew J. Stum
Anyone know what the monks are chanting in Monty Python's The Holy Grail?
Phonetically, I can repeat it, but I'd like to know the latin. Why do I
even think it's legit? Well, the more I watch the stupid thing the more
authentic I see it to be. Kind of scary, eh? I mean, I used to laugh at
their armory... until I learned more about armory. Some of the place-names
they use used to be quite funny... until I found them on maps. Even the
monks themselves were hysterical... until I learned about the practices used
during The Plague to punish yourself in hopes that black death wouldn't.
(Granted, they used flogs and such, but still...)
Anyway, it's just for a bit of fun, and I'm tired of writing it out as
"Bee yay ay-zoo dom-ee-nay, dough-na ay ees requi-em <BAM!>
Bee yay ay-zoo dom-ee-nay <BAM!>, dough-na ay ees requiem <BAM!>"
when I describe it to others.
Thanx!
Shamefully,
Gwydion
--
Matt Stum Gwydion ap Myrddin Ball State University
00mj...@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu Shire of Afonlyn, MK Muncie, IN USA
coz...@garnet.berkeley.edu
>Anyone know what the monks are chanting in Monty Python's The Holy Grail?
I can tell you. They are saying,
"Pie Jesu Domine,
dona eis requiem."
"Good Lord Jesus,
Give them rest."
It's the last two lines--or more properly, I think (any chant historians
around?), it's two lines that got tacked onto the end of--the sequence
_Dies Irae._
If you've seen _The Seventh Seal_ (and if you haven't, dear me, you should),
you'll recognize the scene the Monty Python crew were parodying--where the
group of _penitentes_ come into the village, carrying crosses, beating
themselves with thongs, wearing crowns of thorns, and chanting the _Dies
Irae._
The sequence is about the end of the world and the Last Judgment, and until
recently it used to be sung at funerals. Everyone growing up in Catholic
Europe was intimately familiar with it, which is why it gets into so many
other pieces of music (Liszt's _Totentanz,_ Berlioz's _Symphonie Fantastique,_
etc. etc.).
...Why do I
>even think it's legit? Well, the more I watch the stupid thing the more
>authentic I see it to be. ...
Yes, the Pythons did their homework. (They're all Oxbridge graduates,
after all.)
However, a real flock of penitentes in the Middle Ages would almost certainly
not have gone around chanting just those two lines. They would have sung
the entire _Dies Irae,_ which they would have known by heart, because they
would have heard it
Every All Souls' Day (November 2),
At every funeral,
On the _anniversary_ of the death of anyone whose heirs had enough
money to pay for a memorial Mass.
In other words, every couple of weeks.
If you want the text and the music, send me a snailmail address and I'll
copy it out and send it to you.
Dorothea of Caer-Myrddin Dorothy J. Heydt
Mists/Mists/West UC Berkeley
Argent, a cross forme'e sable coz...@garnet.berkeley.edu
Disclaimer: UCB and the Cozzarelli lab are not responsible for my
opinions, and in fact I don't think they know I have any.
Hossein Ali Qomi (mka Gregory F. Rose)
Gwydion asks for the Latin being parodied in MP's Holy Grail:
>Anyway, it's just for a bit of fun, and I'm tired of writing it out as
> "Bee yay ay-zoo dom-ee-nay, dough-na ay ees requi-em <BAM!>
> Bee yay ay-zoo dom-ee-nay <BAM!>, dough-na ay ees requiem <BAM!>"
>when I describe it to others.
It is:
Beate Ihesu, domine, dona eis requiem.
Blessed Jesus, lord, give them rest.
It is from the litany of the Requiem Mass.
And for your penance for the venial sin of Latin illiteracy... :-)
Hossein/Greg
(who feels mighty smug about having to tell one of these Frankish Christians
what's what about the Latin of the mass...:-)
Nancy A. Zimmerman
The words (my spelling could be wrong, but it's close) are "Pie Jesu Domine,
dona eis requiem." For the life of me (suffering from an excess of air on the
brain today) I can't remember exactly what it means, but it comes from the
Catholic Requiem Mass, and I remember it from doing Mozart's Reqiuem Mass while
in a college choir. (The pathetic thing is, out of a comedic urge I bashed
myself in the forehead with my sheet music folder after we sang this line,
and *NO ONE* got it. This was in community college, see, and none of these
kids had actually seen "Holy Grail." Ah, well...)
Hossein Ali Qomi (mka Gregory F. Rose)
>I can tell you. They are saying,
>
>"Pie Jesu Domine,
>dona eis requiem."
>
>"Good Lord Jesus,
>Give them rest."
>
>It's the last two lines--or more properly, I think (any chant historians
>around?), it's two lines that got tacked onto the end of--the sequence
>_Dies Irae._
Two brief quibbles (although I would certainly not characterize myself as
a liturgical historian):
First, the post-Tridentine form is "Pie," but the pre-Tridentine form is
"Beate." The general re-working of the _ordo_ of the mass made quite a
few changes from usages before the Council of Trent (which is why using
modern musical scores can be misleading, i.e., they use the post-Tridentine
formulae of the chants).
Second, it wasn't that they were tacked onto the end of the sequentia Dies
Irae, but that a litania followed the Dies Irae in the pre-Tridentine ordo
of the requiem mass.
It may well be that you are right in that the Pythoners could well have
used the post-Tridentine form (it's a hell of a lot easier to get access
to post-Tridentine liturgical forms than pre-Tridentine now that we are
post-Vatican II's gelding of the mass ordo).
Hossein/Greg
coz...@garnet.berkeley.edu
>
>Two brief quibbles (although I would certainly not characterize myself as
>a liturgical historian):
Is it really. Do you have access to the chant? How does it scan?
>Second, it wasn't that they were tacked onto the end of the sequentia Dies
>Irae, but that a litania followed the Dies Irae in the pre-Tridentine ordo
>of the requiem mass.
>....(it's a hell of a lot easier to get access
>to post-Tridentine liturgical forms than pre-Tridentine now that we are
>post-Vatican II's gelding of the mass ordo).
Hell, I could never get to pre-Tridentine Mass forms with music _before_
Vatican II. Except occasionally some clever facultyperson at Berkeley
would come up with some. Can you name me some sources?
Peter D. Hampe
Oh exhalted learned effendi, perchance you could
enlighten this poor humble rustic as to the latin text
for a generalized indulgence (the fill in the blank sort
so popular amoungst the unletterd). Or a pinter to a reference
with such a text.
with many blessings on you and your house
I remain
Nikolai Petrovich
--
Pyotr aka Peter D. Hampe : eka py...@halcyon.com
Nothing says loving like a bun in the oven.
EOF
boyko@skyfox
dona eis requiem grant them rest.
it is the last two lines of the dies irae, Wrath of God for the
improperly educated ;-). it is part of the requiem mass. the lines
are chanted in the standard setting, except for the scene involving the
Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch. I am not familiar with that setting.
Laghamonus Vavasour Eboracensis
anything else I can help you with?
Dick Eney
(as is the usual thing with otherwise-untitled Latin texts). It is:
Dies irae, dies illa
Solvaet saeculum in favilla
Teste David cum sybilla
The conventional (tho not quite word for word) Enlish being:
That day of wrath, that dreadful day
When Earth in fire shall pass away
As both sage and sybil say
And then it goes on in that mood for several more verses. A good ole
heretic-stompin' song, as we were wont to say in Clan Cambion. Countess
Alyson of Islay has a modern setting with over twenty verses, but I
believe not all of these are historical -- certainly not the one about the
Waffen SS or the bit about the tabloid writers and the boiling oil.
-- Vuong Manh