Note 1148 — Chapter XIV · THE FEAST OF FOOLS (continued)

In Leber, ix. 379, 407, is described a curious way of raising funds for choir suppers, known at Auxerre and in Auvergne, and not quite extinct in the eighteenth century. It has a certain analogy to the Deposuit. From Christmas to Epiphany the Psalm Memento was sung at Vespers, and the anthem De fructu ventris inserted in it. When this began the ruler of the choir advanced and presented a bouquet to some canon or bourgeois as a sign that the choir would sup with him. This was called ‘annonce en forme d’antienne,’ and the suppers defructus. The C. of Narbonne (1551), c. 47, forbade ‘parochis ... ne ... ad commessationes quas defructus appellant, ullo modo parochianos suos admittant, nec permittant quempiam canere ut dicunt: Memento, Domine, David sans truffe, &c. Nec alia huiusmodi ridenda, quae in contemptum divini officii ac in dedecus et probrum totius cleri et fiunt et cantantur.’