The Hymn Dóme Jévfratov/Οἶκος τοῦ Ἐφραθᾶ : An Outline of the development of the musical-liturgical tradition

Abstrakt

In this paper I will present the development of a hymn - a so-called samopodoben hymn - with incipit Dóme Jevfráthov in the Byzantine liturgical tradition. It is a hymn for the pre-Christmas season, which became the textual and melodic model for number of other hymns.

It is the only example of a hymn of this type on which it is possible to trace continuity from the earliest records in Greek manuscripts from the 11th century to the current tradition in the Slovak Greek Catholic Church. The aim of this paper is to show the musical as well as the textual development of the chant.

In this paper I will first present the context of Byzantine liturgy and hymnography, then show the development of chant and its liturgical use from selected Greek and Church Slavonic sources from the 11th to the 20th centuries. The aim of the paper is to show the processes of change that arise mainly through the influence of memory and oral tradition.

It also aims to evaluate the tactics of translation and musical adaptation on the background of the ideal form of the liturgy.