ABSTRACT
Among the motets attributed to Josquin des Prez, those which set gospel texts have been accorded relatively little attention in the scholarly literature.! However two of these motets raise several issues that provide a starting point for reframing general questions of tonal organization in polyphony from the first quarter of the sixteenth century. Focusing on the intraopus style of these motets in relation to motet composition in general brings to the fore the complicated interplay of preexisting musical material, liturgical associations, and generic conventions that determine tonal structure in sacred vocal polyphony from about 1500.2 Although consideration of the use of pre-existent material has become almost a commonplace in studies of this repertory, 3 scholars have concentrated on the constructive, mensural, symbolic, allusive, and rhetorical significance of such borrowing rather than the relationship between pre-existent material and the "tonal coherence" of the resulting composition.4
