ABSTRACT
The third and fourth centuries were a time of rapid expansion for the church. Some of conciliar decisions impinged on the music of the church. The third and fourth centuries also saw the rise of Christian monasticism. Early Christian monasticism was basically of three types: anchoritic, in which anchorites or hermits lived alone in small, isolated, single-room dwellings called cells. The greatest concentration of monastic communities was in the Nile delta of Lower Egypt and along the western bank of the Nile in Upper Egypt. From the earliest days of Christianity, prayer was an important element in the religious life of believers. The tractates of the Nag Hammadi codices are Coptic translations of Greek originals some of which probably emanated from elsewhere in the eastern Mediterranean lands than Egypt. The circumstances in which the early Christian hymns were used, and the formal and literary features of the hymns, provide valuable pointers to the musical style employed when the hymns were sung.
