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Alamire
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IDEM
Integrated Database for Early music
IDEM – Integrated Database for Early Music

IDEM is an interdisciplinary and multifaceted database of manuscripts and printed books that are relevant to the Alamire Foundation's research and activities. It therefore especially focuses on the musical heritage of the Low Countries from the early Middle Ages until 1800.

IDEM contains digital images of manuscripts and prints digitized by the Alamire Digital Lab, the high-technology photography centre of the Alamire Foundation (KU Leuven – Musicology Research Unit). Its state-of-the-art equipment allows musical sources to be photographed following the strictest standards and quality requirements.

The core database is complemented by interrelated sub-databases that enable the consultation and study of manuscript and printed sources from multiple perspectives. IDEM will eventually contain information about every aspect of the manuscripts and books concerned, including their physical characteristics, their content and illumination, as well as recordings, editions and so-called 'fake-similes' (adapted versions of the original images, facilitating performance from the original notation).

IDEM is thus designed to be an online, freely accessible platform and tool for the preservation, study, and valorisation of the music heritage of the Low Countries.

June 2025 - In the spotlight: Royal Library of Belgium (KBR), Ms. 228

Six manuscripts from the atelier of Petrus Alamire are now preserved in the Royal Library of Belgium. Each one bears witness to the popularity of the polyphonic repertoire of the Franco-Flemish composers in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. While it is impossible to ascertain the intended recipients of all the Alamire manuscripts, some contain direct and indirect references to their patrons. Manuscript 228, for example, leaves little room for interpretation: the first opening of the choirbook is adorned with a beautiful miniature of Margaret of Austria, depicted kneeling in prayer, surrounded by daisies in the margins. With its 58 polyphonic compositions, the vast majority of which are secular songs, the manuscript is known as “the large chansonnier of Margaret of Austria”. The description in the inventories of Margaret's library (“Item, ung aultre grant livre de chant, couvert de velours tanner, a cloz dorez”) enables us to date the codex between 1516 and 1523.
 
A quick glance at the recorded repertoire immediately reveals that this was an extremely personal manuscript. Not only is her favourite composer, Pierre de La Rue, particularly well represented, but several compositions also refer to some fateful events in her life. For example, the motet-chanson Se je souspire / Ecce iterum novus, in which the mournful words “doleo super te frater mi philippe” resound explicitly in the tenor part, refers to the death of her brother, Philip the Fair. Or the anonymous Proch dolor, a lament on the death of her father Maximilian in 1519. This seven-part motet was written entirely in black notes; the number 7 was also symbolic of sorrow and pain. The work is based on music taken from the last verse of the Dies irae, to the text “Pie Jhesu domine, dona ei(s) requiem”. At the top left we find the inscription “Celum terra mariaque succurrite pio”. The meaning of this phrase reveals how this canon should be performed: in heaven (superius), on earth (tenor) and deep in the sea (bassus). Discover the auditory result in the new innovative sound installation that the Alamire Foundation designed specifically for the Nassau Chapel.

View the source: here.