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Stabat Mater

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Pietro Perugino 's depiction of Mary at the Cross, 1482. ( National Gallery, Washington )

The Stabat Mater is a 13th-century Christian hymn to the Virgin Mary that portrays her suffering as mother during the crucifixion of her son Jesus Christ. Its author may be either the Franciscan friar Jacopone da Todi or Pope Innocent III.[1] The title comes from its first line, "Stabat Mater dolorosa", which means "the sorrowful mother was standing".[2]

The hymn is sung at the liturgy on the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. The Stabat Mater has been set to music by many Western composers.

Date

The Stabat Mater has often been ascribed to Jacopone da Todi (ca. 1230–1306), but this has been strongly challenged by the discovery of the earliest notated copy of the Stabat Mater in a 13th-century gradual belonging to the Dominican nuns in Bologna (Museo Civico Medievale MS 518, fo. 200v-04r).[3]

The Stabat Mater was well known by the end of the 14th century and Georgius Stella wrote of its use in 1388, while other historians note its use later in the same century. In Provence, about 1399, it was used during the nine days' processions.

As a liturgical sequence, the Stabat Mater was suppressed, along with hundreds of other sequences, by the Council of Trent, but restored to the missal by Pope Benedict XIII in 1727 for the Feast of the Seven Dolours of the Blessed Virgin Mary.[4]

Text and translation

The Latin text below is from an 1853 Roman Breviary and is one of multiple extant versions of the poem.[5] The first English translation by Edward Caswall is not literal but preserves the trochaic tetrameter rhyme scheme and sense of the original text. The second English version is a more formal equivalence translation.

1. Stabat mater dolorósa
juxta Crucem lacrimósa,
dum pendébat Fílius.

2. Cuius ánimam geméntem,
contristántem et doléntem
pertransívit gládius.

3. O quam tristis et afflícta
fuit illa benedícta,
mater Unigéniti!

4. Quæ mœrébat et dolébat,
pia Mater, dum vidébat
nati pœnas ínclyti.

5. Quis est homo qui non fleret,
matrem Christi si vidéret
in tanto supplício?

6. Quis non posset contristári
Christi Matrem contemplári
doléntem cum Fílio?

7. Pro peccátis suæ gentis
vidit Jésum in torméntis,
et flagéllis súbditum.

8. Vidit suum dulcem Natum
moriéndo desolátum,
dum emísit spíritum.

9. Eja, Mater, fons amóris
me sentíre vim dolóris
fac, ut tecum lúgeam.

10. Fac, ut árdeat cor meum
in amándo Christum Deum
ut sibi compláceam.

11. Sancta Mater, istud agas,
crucifíxi fige plagas
cordi meo válide.

12. Tui Nati vulneráti,
tam dignáti pro me pati,
pœnas mecum dívide.

13. Fac me tecum pie flere,
crucifíxo condolére,
donec ego víxero.

14. Juxta Crucem tecum stare,
et me tibi sociáre
in planctu desídero.

15. Virgo vírginum præclára,
mihi iam non sis amára,
fac me tecum plángere.

16. Fac ut portem Christi mortem,
passiónis fac consórtem,
et plagas recólere.

17. Fac me plagis vulnerári,
fac me Cruce inebriári,
et cruóre Fílii.

18. Flammis ne urar succénsus,
per te, Virgo, sim defénsus
in die iudícii.

19. Christe, cum sit hinc exire,
da per Matrem me veníre
ad palmam victóriæ.

20. Quando corpus moriétur,
fac, ut ánimæ donétur
paradísi glória.

Amen.[6] 		At the Cross her station keeping,
Stood the mournful Mother weeping,
Close to Jesus to the last:

Through her heart, his sorrow sharing,
All his bitter anguish bearing,
now at length the sword has pass'd.

Oh, how sad and sore distress'd
Was that Mother highly blest
Of the sole-begotten One!

Christ above in torment hangs;
She beneath beholds the pangs
Of her dying glorious Son.

Is there one who would not weep,
Whelm'd in miseries so deep,
Christ's dear Mother to behold?

Can the human heart refrain
From partaking in her pain,
In that Mother's pain untold?

Bruis'd, derided, curs'd, defil'd,
She beheld her tender Child
All with bloody scourges rent;

For the sins of his own nation,
Saw Him hang in desolation,
Till His Spirit forth He sent.

O thou Mother! fount of love!
Touch my spirit from above,
Make my heart with thine accord:

Make me feel as thou hast felt;
Make my soul to glow and melt
With the love of Christ my Lord.

Holy Mother! pierce me through;
In my heart each wound renew
Of my Saviour crucified:

Let me share with thee His pain,
Who for all my sins was slain,
Who for me in torments died.

Let me mingle tears with thee,
Mourning Him who mourn'd for me,
All the days that I may live:

By the Cross with thee to stay;
There with thee to weep and pray;
Is all I ask of thee to give.

Virgin of all virgins blest!,
Listen to my fond request:
Let me share thy grief divine;

Let me, to my latest breath,
In my body bear the death
Of that dying Son of thine.

Wounded with his every wound,
Steep my soul till it hath swoon'd,
In His very blood away;

Be to me, O Virgin, nigh,
Lest in flames I burn and die,
In his awful Judgment day.

Christ, when Thou shalt call me hence,
Be Thy Mother my defence,
Be Thy Cross my victory;

While my body here decays,
May my soul thy goodness praise,
Safe in Paradise with Thee.
– Translation by Edward Caswall[7] 		The sorrowful mother was standing
beside the Cross weeping,
while the Son was hanging.

Whose moaning soul,
depressed and grieving,
the sword has passed through.

O how sad and stricken
was that blessed [woman],
mother of the Only-begotten!

Who was mourning and suffering,
the pious Mother, while she was watching
the punishments of the glorious son.

Who is the person who would not weep,
if he had seen the mother of Christ
in such great suffering?

Who would not be able to be saddened
to behold the Mother of Christ
grieving with the Son?

For the sins of his people
she saw Jesus in torments,
and subjected to lashes.

She saw her sweet Son
dying forsaken,
while he sent forth [his] spirit.

Come now, Mother, fountain of love
Make me feel the power of sorrow
that I might mourn with you.

Grant that my heart may burn
in loving Christ the God
that I might please him.

Holy Mother, may you do that,
fix the wounds of the crucified
mightily in my heart.

Of your wounded son,
[who] so deigned to suffer for me,
Share [his] penalties with me.

Make me cry dutifully with you,
to suffer with the crucified,
as long as I shall have lived.

To stand by the Cross with you,
to unite me to you
in weeping [this] I desire.

Noble Virgin of virgins,
Be not bitter with me now,
Make me mourn with you.

Grant that I might bear the death of Christ,
Make [me] kindred in the passion,
and contemplate the wounds.

Make me injured by the wounds,
make me drunken by the Cross,
and by the blood of the Son.

Lest I be consumed burned by flames,
through you, Virgin, may I be defended
on the day of judgement.

Christ, when it is time to depart hence,
grant me to come through the Mother,
to the palm of victory.

When the body will decay,
grant that it may be bestowed on [my] soul
the glory of paradise.

Amen.

Indulgence

To the Stabat mater was attributed the indulgence of 100 days each time it was recited.[8]

Musical settings

Composers who have written settings of the Stabat Mater include:

Most settings are in Latin. Karol Szymanowski's setting is in Polish, although it may also be sung in Latin. George Oldroyd's setting is in Latin with an English translation for Anglican and Episcopalian use.

See also

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

The opening words of two companion hymns, one of which (Stabat Mater Dolorosa) is in liturgical use, while the other (Stabat Mater Speciosa) is not. They celebrate the emotions of Our Lady at the Cross and at the Manger — Calvary and Bethlehem — respectively, and may conveniently be differentiated here by the third word (Dolorosa, Speciosa). The Speciosa contains thirteen (double) stanzas of six lines; the Dolorosa, ten. In other respects the two hymns are in quite perfect parallelism of phrase throughout, as the first stanza may serve to illustrate:

Stabat mater dolorosa speciosa
Juxta crucem lacrimosa foenum gaudiosa
Dum pendebat filius jacebat filius

The question, which is the original, which the imitation, will be discussed under II. THE SPECIOSA.

I. The Dolorosa

The hymn was well known to all classes by the end of the fourteenth century. Georgius Stella, Chancellor of Genoa (d. 1420), in his "Annales Genuenses", speaks of it as in use by the Flagellants in 1388, and other historians note its use later in the same century. In Provence, about 1399, the "Albati", or "Bianchi", sang it during their nine days' processions. "The Church did not receive the hymn from the heretics, but the heretics despoiled the Church of the Sequence" (Daniel, "Thesaurus Hymnologicus", II, 140). If the very questionable ascription to Jacopone da Todi be correct, the hymn probably found its way from Franciscan houses into those of other religious bodies and into popular use. It is found in several European (but not English) Missals of the fifteenth century, but was not introduced into the Roman Breviary and Missal until 1727 (Feast of the Seven Dolours B. V. M., assigned to Friday after Passion Sunday. The September feast of the same name employs other hymns in the Breviary Office). In the Breviary it is divided into three parts: at Vespers, "Stabat Mater dolorosa"; at Matins, "Sancta Mater, istud agas"; at Lauds, "Virgo virginum praeclara".

The authorship of the hymn has been ascribed to St. Gregory the Great (d. 604), St. Bernard of Clairvaux (d. 1153), Innocent III (d. 1216), St. Bonaventure (d. 1274), Jacopone (d. 1306), Pope John XXII (d. 1334), Gregory XI (d. 1378). Of these ascriptions, the only probable ones are those to Innocent III and Jacopone. Benedict XIV gives it without question to Innocent, and quotes three authorities; Mone, in his notes, and Hurter, in his "Life", give it to the same great pontiff. Duffield, in his "Latin Hymn Writers and their Hymns", rejects with much positiveness, and Mearns, in Julian, "Dictionary of Hymnology", questions, the ascription. Gregorovius also denies it to the pope of "the great and cold intellect"; but for a similar reason he might question the ascription of the Corpus Christi hymns, redolent of devotional warmth and sweetness, to the rigorously scholastic mind of St. Thomas Aquinas; he adds, however, a reference to a fourteenth-century manuscript containing poems by Jacopone with an ascription to him of the Stabat. The argument for Jacopone is not satisfactory. While his hymns written in the Umbrian dialect commanded popularity and deserved respect, some of the Latin hymns ascribed to him are certainly not his, and it is doubtful if he ever wrote any — or at all events anything better than imitations of — Latin hymns.

A large literature has grown about the hymns, Protestants sharing with Catholics a deep, and often glowingly expressed, admiration for its pathos, its vividness of description, its devotional sweetness and unction, its combination of easy rhythmic flow with exquisite double rhyming and finished stanzaic form. Daniel styles it "the queen of sequences" (op. cit., V, 59) and devotes much space to its praise (II, 136-138). Dr. Philip Schaff (in "Literature and Poetry", 191) says: "The secret of the power of the 'Mater Dolorosa' lies in the intensity of feeling with which the poet identifies himself with his theme, and in the soft, plaintive melody of its Latin rhythm and rhyme, which cannot be transferred to any other language." Dr. Coles, a physician, devotes a long "Proem" to his own translation, to an estimate of the hymn, and thinks the hymn "powerful in its pathos beyond almost anything that has ever been written". Mingled with his praise is much very strong denunciation of its "Mariolatry." Schaff also notes the usual Protestant objection, but gently answers his co-religionists, concluding with the reminder that Catholics "do not pray to Mary as the giver of the mercies desired, but only as the interceder, thinking that she is more likely to prevail with her Son than any poor unaided sinner on earth". This affection of Protestants for the hymn has resulted in manifold translation. Dean Trench, however, excluded the hymn from his "Sacred Latin Poetry", and Saintsbury, in "The Flourishing of Romance" (p. 77, footnote), characterizes the exclusion as "a little touch of orthodox prudery". There are over sixty translations into English (in whole or in part), Caswall's being the most extensively used in hymnals. Amongst the translations are those of D. F. McCarthy, Aubrey de Vere, and Father Tabb.

Because of its vividly epic and lyric character, the hymn has received multiform musical setting. There are four well-known plainsong settings, the authentic form being found in the Vatican Gradual (1908). Josquin des Prés (fifteenth century) wrote a Stabat as elaborate as any of his "most highly developed Masses" (Rockstro). His great effort was distanced by the immortalizing twain of settings by Palestrina. Of Pergolesi's Stabat the German poet Tieck confesses: "I had to turn away to hide my tears, especially at the place, 'Vidit suum dulcem natum'". Haydn's Stabat is considered "a treasury of refined and graceful melody". Some less familiar names in the long list are Steffani, Clari, Astorga, Winter, Raimondi, Vito, Lanza, Neukomm. Rossini had written his "William Tell" before he essayed his much-abused Stabat. While it is not indeed fitted for liturgical use, Father Taunton (History and Growth of Church Music, 78-9) defends it; and Rockstro, refusing to discuss the question whether its sensuous beauty befits the theme, thinks that "critics who judge it harshly, and dilettanti who can listen to it unmoved... must either be case-hardened by pedantry, or destitute of all 'ear for music'". The long list may close with Dvořák, who, in his original musical phrases, illustrated anew the perennial freshness of the theme.

II. The Speciosa

An edition of the Italian poems of Jacopone published at Brescia in 1495 contained both Stabats; but the Speciosa fell into almost complete oblivion until A.F. Ozanam transcribed it from a fifteenth-century manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale for his "Poètes Franciscains en Italie au Treizième siècle", Paris, 1852. He thought Jacopone had composed both Stabats at the same time; and remarking of the Dolorosa that "this incomparable work would have sufficed for the glory of Jacopone", he confesses that he gave up the attempt to translate the Speciosa in verse, and concluded to present both hymns in simple prose, because "the untranslatable charm of the language, of the melody, and of the old quaintness, I feel are escaping me". The Anglican hymnologist, Dr. J. M. Neale, introduced the Speciosa to the English-speaking world in 1866, and ascribed it to Jacopone. Dr. Schaff dissents. "This is improbable. A poet would hardly write a parody on a poem of his own." Noting the unfinished style and the imperfect rhyme of the Speciosa, Neale thought it indicated the work of an apprentice shaping his hand to the work of Latin verse — in which case it must have preceded the Dolorosa, which is a perfect piece of work. Schaff, however, points out that the opening words of the Dolorosa were borrowed from the Vulgate Latin (John, xix, 25) "with reference to Mary at the Cross, but not at the Cradle", and also that the sixth line, "Pertransivit gladius", might have suggested the similar line of the Speciosa, "Pertransivit jubilus", but not vice versa. Coles doubts "a simultaneous birth, or even a common parentage". In his "Essay on Minor Rites and Ceremonies" Cardinal Wiseman seized on the parallelism of contrast in the two poems — similarity of form and phrase, and complete antithesis of theme and thought. Finally, it should be said that the great ruggedness of the Speciosa may be due to the carelessness of copyists.

KAYSER, Beiträge zur Geschichte und Erklärung der ältesten Kirchenhymnen, II (Paderborn, 1886), 110 - 192, gives text of both Stabats with variants and much comment. HENRY, The Two Stabats, in Amer. Cath. Quarterly Rev. (January, 1903), 68 - 89 and (Apr., 1903), 291 - 309, texts and translations, comment on authorship and "Mariolatry", and comparison of trs.; COLES, Stabat Mater (Dolorosa) (2nd ed., New York, 1868); IDEM, Stabat Mater (Speciosa) (New York, 1868); JULIAN, Dict. of Hymnology (2nd ed., London, 1907), 1081 - 84, 1590, 1706. To his entries must be added HENRY (as above); TABB in Catholic News (New York, Apr. 7, 1906), In the Shadow of the Rood; MCKENZIE in The Beacon (Boston, May 7, 1887); Stood the Virgin Mother Weeping, and others noted in HENRY, loc. cit.; BAGSHAWE, Breviary Hymns and Missal Sequences (London, 1900), 109, The Mother in deep sorrow stood; DONAHOE in Early Christian Hymns (New York, 1908), 197, Waiting by the cross atoning; a good version, perhaps by a Catholic, reprinted in The Catholic World (April, 1870) from The Democratic Magazine of thirty years previously: Brokenhearted, lo, and tearful. The same issue of The Catholic World has a tr. into Greek by MAYER. VICTORI in Coecilia (Strasburg, Dec., 1909) analyzes the Christus of FRANZ LISZT (the Speciosa, 182 - 5; the Dolorosa, 196 - 200); SHIPLEY adds others in Amer. Eccl. Review, XII (1895), 453. PACHEU, L'Auteur du 'Stabat"/i> in Revue du Clergé Français (Mar., 1904), 163 - 75, thinks the author is, in all probability, Jacopone, and that the Speciosa is not his, but probably the work of some humanist of the fifteenth century. D'UDENHOUT, Le 'Stabat Mater Speciosa' de Jacopone da Todi, in Etudes Franciscaines (Aug., 1909) 140 - 8. SHIPLEY, Annus Sanctus (London, 1884), gives the trs. of MCCARTHY, DE VERE, and AYLWARD. There is an anonymous tr. of the Speciosa (Joy her tender breast expanding), quoted from The Catholic Magazine in The Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary (London, s. d.), 62. DREVES, Analecta hymnica (Leipzig, 1888), gives many poems founded on the Dolorosa, e.g. XXIV, 127; 150; 122 (from a Dominican Breviary, fifteenth century); see also II, 53, and VIII, 55 - 56, for illustrations of the fourteenth to the fifteenth century. HUSENBETH, Missal for the Use of the Laity (new ed., London, 1906), 234 - 6, gives Latin text and new translation. The Latin text is in many places different from that of the Roman Missal (although the preface declares that the book "will be found strictly conformable to the Roman Missal, as used by authority in this country" — sc. England). The Latin text includes the line, "Inflammatus et accensus", which is not in the Roman Missal text, but is found in Rossini's, and even in Liszt's Stabat Mater. For information concerning the line, cf. KAYSER, HENRY, opp. cit., or MONE, Lateinishche Hymnen des Mittelalters, II, 148, at end. The typical and official text of the Vatican Graduale (1908) is the same as that of the Roman Missal.

Fr. Paul-Dominique Masiclat, O.P.

References

  1. Back to citation Sabatier, Paul Life of St. Francis Assisi Charles Scribner Press, NY, 1919, page 286; The seven great hymns of the Mediaeval Church by Charles Cooper Nott 1868 ASIN: B003KCW2LA page 96; p. 574, Alighieri, Durling, Martinez (2003) Dante, Robert M., Ronald L. Oxford The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: Purgatorio Volume 2 of The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri Oxford University Press. "The Stabat Mater by the Franciscan Jacopone da Todi."
  2. Back to citation Stabat Mater, Volume 68 by Girolamo Abos, Joseph Vella Bondin 2003 ISBN 0-89579-531-0 page xviii
  3. Back to citation Cesarino Ruini, "Un antico versione dello Stabat Mater in un graduale delle Domenicane bolognesi," Deo è lo scrivano ch’el canto à ensegnato: Segni e simboli nella musica al tempo di Iacopone, Atti del Convegno internazionale, Collazzone, 7-8 luglio 2006, ed. Ernesto Sergio Mainoldi and Stefania Vitale, Philomusica On-line, 9, no. 3 (2010).
  4. Back to citation Heartz, Daniel (1995). Haydn, Mozart and the Viennese School: 1740-1780. W.W. Norton & Co. p. 305. ISBN 0-393-03712-6. Retrieved 3 April 2011.
  5. Back to citation "Stabat Mater Dolorosa and Speciosa". The Ultimate Stabat Mater Website. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  6. Back to citation Breviarum Romanum. Mechelen: H. Dessain. 1853. pp. 455–456, 460–461.
  7. Back to citation Caswall, Edward (1849). Lyra Catholica. London: James Burns. pp. 138–142.
  8. Back to citation Don Giovanni Bosco (1935). Il giovane provveduto per la pratica dei suoi doveri religiosi [The young man provided for the practice of his religious duties] (in Italian). Turin: International Publishing Company, Tipografia S.E.I. (M. E. 9736), c.so Regina Margherita, n. 176. pp. 341–342. “new edition, enriched with prayers according to the catechism, Masses and antiphons in Gregorian chant, and authorized by Don Paolo Albera, Rector Major of the Pious Salesian Society”
  9. Back to citation occurrence 9.00 Back to citation occurrence 9.01 Back to citation occurrence 9.02 Back to citation occurrence 9.03 Back to citation occurrence 9.04 Back to citation occurrence 9.05 Back to citation occurrence 9.06 Back to citation occurrence 9.07 Back to citation occurrence 9.08 Back to citation occurrence 9.09 Back to citation occurrence 9.10 Back to citation occurrence 9.11 Dvořák: Stabat Mater. Oratorio for Soloists, Chorus and Orchestra at Supraphon website.
  10. Back to citation Entry for Antoni Soler's Stabat Mater at The Ultimate Stabat Mater Site: A Musical Journey Through the Ages. [Accessed 16 December 2020].
  11. Back to citation "Kuula - The ultimate Stabat Mater site". The ultimate Stabat Mater site. Retrieved 2018-04-06.
  12. Back to citation "James MacMillan - Stabat Mater". Boosey & Hawkes. Retrieved 2017-04-14.
  13. Back to citation Stabat Mater for mezzo-soprano and male choir (2017)
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