cantus

American  

[kan-tuhs] / ˈkæn təs /

noun

plural

cantus

1. cantus firmus.

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cantus British  

/ ˈkæntəs /

noun

1. a medieval form of church singing; chant

2. Also called: canto.  the highest part in a piece of choral music

3. (in 15th- or 16th-century music) a piece of choral music, usually secular, in polyphonic style

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Etymology

Origin of cantus

From Latin, dating back to 1580–90; see origin at canto

Example Sentences

Each section is built on a simple cantus firmus — a brief, unharmonized chant — around which a rich, involving six-part harmonic fabric is woven.

From New York Times • Apr. 3, 2011

The album of folk-inspired Christmas music, a welcome change from today's homogenized carols, ranges from a 12th century Latin tune, Ad cantus leticie, to a rousing Gloucestershire Wassail from modern Britain.

From Time Magazine Archive

The given melody or “principal” soon acquired the name of cantus firmus, and the other parts were each called contrapunctus, 11  as before they had been called tenor and descant.

From Critical and Historical Essays Lectures delivered at Columbia University by Baltzell, W. J. (Winton James)

Districtus ensis cui super impia Ceruice pendet, non Siculæ dapes Dulcem elaborabunt saporem, Non auium cytharæq. cantus.

From Chronicles (3 of 6): Historie of England (1 of 9) Henrie IV by Holinshed, Raphael

All the devices of counterpoint, with their two, three and four tones of the moving voice against one of the cantus fermus, were so many incitations in the direction of melodic cleverness.

From A Popular History of the Art of Music From the Earliest Times Until the Present by Mathews, W. S. B. (William Smythe Babcock)