Estampie

Musical Form

The estampie is an important form of instrumental music of the 13th and 14th centuries. It consists of four to seven sections, called puncta, each of which is repeated, in the form
aa, bb, cc, etc..
Different endings (ouvert (open) and clos (closed)) are provided for the first and second statement of each punctum, so that the structure can be
a+x, a+y; b+w, b+z; etc..
Sometimes the same two endings are used for all the puncta, producing the structure
a+x, a+y; b+x, b+y, c+x, c+y, etc..
A similar structure was shared with the saltarello, another medieval dance.
The earliest reported example of this musical form is the song "Kalenda Maya", supposedly written by the troubadour Raimbaut de Vaqueiras (1180-1207) to the melody of an estampida played by french jongleurs. All other known examples are purely instrumental pieces. 14th century examples include estampies with subtitles such as Lamento di Tristano, La Manfredina, Salterello, Isabella, Tre fontane.
Though the estampie is generally monophonic, examples of two-voice compositions in the form of an estampie are also reported.

Dance Choreography

The idealized dance character of all these pieces suggests that the estampie originally was a true dance. There are no surviving dance manuals describing the estampie as a dance. Illuminations and paintings from the period seem to indicate that the estampie involves fairly vigorous hopping. Some estampies, such as the famous Tre fontane ("Three Fountains") estampie, contain florid and virtuosic instrumental writing; they may have been intended as abstract performance music rather than actual dance music.