Fauxbourdon (also fauxbordon, and also commonly two words: faux bourdon or faulx bourdon, and in Italian falso bordone) – French for false drone – is a technique of musical harmonisation used in the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance, particularly by composers of the Burgundian School. Guillaume Dufay was a prominent practitioner of the form (as was John Dunstaple), and may have been its inventor. The homophony and mostly parallel harmony allows the text of the mostly liturgical lyrics to be understood clearly. Description In its simplest form, fauxbourdon consists of the cantus firmus and two other parts a sixth and a perfect fourth below. To prevent monotony, or create a cadence, the lowest voice sometimes jumps down to the octave, and any of the accompanying voices may have minor embellishments. Usually just a small part of a composition employs the fauxbourdon technique. Hymn singing In a hymn, the term is sometimes used when the congregation sings in parallel octaves, with some singers singing a descant over the melody, but the term was historically used to indicate an arrangement of the tune in four parts with the melody in the tenor voice, such as those composed by sixteenth- and seventeenth-century English composers including John Dowland, Giles Farnaby, and Thomas Ravenscroft. History The earliest explicit example of fauxbourdon may be in the manuscript I-BC Q15 (Bologna, Museo Internazionale e Biblioteca della Musica, MS Q15), compiled around 1435, which contains several examples, including one by Dufay dating probably to around 1430. Since many early 15th century compositions are anonymous, and dating is often problematic, exact determination of the authorship of the earliest fauxbourdon is difficult. Dufay's contribution to this collection contains the first actual use of the term, in the closing part of his Missa Sancti Jacobi. It is possible that his use of the word "bourdon" was intended as a pun on St. James' "staff" (which Dufay, or the copyist, drew in miniature above the music). Cividale, Museo Civico MS 101 has a work "O salutaris hostia" (f. 82v) which seems to be a work of fauxbourdon, but not labelled as such. The earliest definitely datable example of fauxbourdon is in a motet by Dufay, Supremum est mortalibus, which was written for the treaty reconciling the differences between Pope Eugene IV and Sigismund, after which Sigismund was crowned as Holy Roman Emperor, which happened on 31 May 1433. In this motet,