ABSTRACT
After July 1904, Pécoul's battles in relation to Gregorian chant entered a new and increasingly toxic phase, based at the Vatican via Dom Lucien David and leaving the French government behind. When Mocquereau sent Pothier his resignation as chief editor of the Vatican Edition on 17 July 1905 he mentioned nothing of origins, tradition, variants or decadent readings. Dom Pothier's stated aim for the Vatican Edition was 'to make, from among the variants, a truly rational selection that fully satisfies the rights of archeology, but without underestimating the demands of practice'. Dom Mocquereau himself presents a more complex intellectual trajectory than has hitherto been acknowledged. The implications of that possibility for Dom Mocquereau's rhythmic innovations are, of course, significant. Even if one stops short of the hypothesis that they might never have existed, they would hardly have flourished.
