chant

According to Roman rituals it was a series of sang prayers that sanctified the entire process of days and nights. Prayer meetings which were related to parts of the day and which originated from the Jewish religion were established by the age of Saint Benedict (around 530). According to that the following Hours were distinguished: matutinum, laudes, prima, tertia, sexta, nona, vesperas and completorium. The most important ones were the laudes at dawn and the vesperas at dusk (this last one was often referred to as "vecsernye" by a Hungarian dialect). The core material of chants are psalms which are supplemented by the antiphones as framework songs and the recitated readings replied by responsoriums. Hymns written in verse played a role in the middle of the long prayer meetings (laudes, vesperas and the completorium) and before the canticum of the New Testament and at the beginning of the short Hours. Both among monks and in the cathedral-parochial practice the commonly sang choir prayer was the norm; the individually and quietly read Brevarium was only widespread at a later date (initiated by Rome in the 12-13th century).

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