Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 June 2001
The music for the Office of St Ethelbert, king and martyr, survives uniquely in the thirteenth-century Hereford Noted Breviary. While some of the chants are contrafacta, others appear to be unique to this office and even in some cases to be influenced by the content of their texts, which are based on the vita of the sainted king by Gerald of Wales. The form in which the office was performed depended on its position in relation to the Easter Cycle (the feast fell on 20 May), and this in turn raises issues for the editing of such offices in modern times.