Cornuel, Jean (…-1499). Musician; Singer

Reynolds 1995, p. 128: In the 1470s Cornuel sent a verse letter to Nicholas Rembert in Rome, in which his ties to France are plainly stated. Pleading for assistance in procuring benefices, Cornuel reveals that he and Rembert were both from Boullenois. He also mentioned two other French musicians; Michault and Leporis. Michault is most likely Michault Sauvage de le Lutin, a singer in the French Royal Chapel from 1461-62 to 1469-70. And Leporis is surely the singer Thomas Leporis, in the papal chapel from 1458 to 1472 (thus he and Cornuel were in Rome at the same time). In the 1470s Leporis went to Paris and Savoy recruiting singers for Milan, implying that he also had some more stable connection with Paris. Michault's dates are in Perkins1984, p. 554; on Leporis see Starr, "Music and Music Patronage," 191-96. For Cornuel, there is André Pirro, "Jean Cornuel, vicaire à Cambrai"; and E. Droz, "Notes sur Me Jean Cornuel, dit Verjus."

Petit vicaire à Cambrai de 1475 à sa mort en 1499. was a small vicar from 24 April 1475 to 15 March 1485 and 07 November 1485 to 02 July 1492 [LAN, 4G 7472 (1474-75), 6v; (1484-85), 8r; (1485-86), 7v; (1491-92), 8r]. On his advent in the wine account he is referred to as Iohannes Cormer, but his identity can be established by his position in the list in the following years and by an entry in the aumosne for 1474-75 [LAN, 4G 7765 (1474-75), 18r], which refers to him a Iohannes Cornuel. Later accounts shift inconsistently between his patronymic and his sobriquet. He came to Cambrai from Thérouanne and had been assaulted by armed men en route [LAN, 4G 7765 (1474-75), 18r]. The hiatus in his service came about whe he was dismissed for using abusive language to refer to Cornelius de Berghes, brother of the bishop of Cambrai [CMB 1061, 211]. On 24 March 14779he collated the chaplaincy of St. Nicholas in the parish church of Jurbise, resigned by Martin Tranchet [CBM 1061, 70r] and on 15 August 1480 he collated the chaplaincy of St. Elizabeth resigned by Robert Lamour [CBM 1061, 114r]. He held the chaplaincy of the Trinity as a foreign chaplaincy in 1480-81 [LAN, 4G 6959, 42r] and became a member of the grand community in 1485-86, remaining in the lists until 1498-99 [LAN, 4G 6967, 13v; 4G 6981, 22v]. On 17 September 1481 he collated the chaplaincy of St. James, resigned by Jehan le Mannier, and resigned his chaplaincy of St. John Baptist to Jehan de Bauvoir [CBM 1061, 133r]. His attempt in 1489 to exchange the chaplaincy of St. James for a benefice outside Cambrai, a chaplaincy of the BVM in the parish church of Gavere, was foiled by the chapter because the chaplaincy of St. James was one of the thirty “vicarial” chaplaincies that the cathedral used for the support of its own clergy, and the exchange would have given it to an outsider [CBM 1064, 156r]. Cornuel died on 22 August 1499 (executors swore on 23 August) [CBM 1064, 204r], and the day after his chaplaincy of St. James went to Henry de Monthenry [CBM 1064, 204r]. Cornuel was, by his own testimony, a native of the region of Boulogne sur mer. He became a friend of the poet Jehan Molinet, canon of Valenciennes, and among the works of Molinet in Tournai, Bibliothèque de la Ville, MS 105, is a long poem by Molinet addressed to Cornuel, and a versified letter of Cornuel to Nicolas Reimbert, canon of Cambrai, resident in Rome, both in Eugénie Droz, “Notes sur Me Jean Cornuel, dit Verjus, petit vicaire de Cambrai,” Revue de Musicologie 7 (1926), 173-189, both of which contain some biographical information on him. An account of his life in Cambrai appears in André Pirro, “Jehan Cornuel, Vicaire à Cambrai,” Revue de Musicologie 7 (1926), 190-203. He was in Tours, perhaps in the 1450s [Molinet], became a singer at San Pietro in Vaticano in 1465 [Reynolds, Papal Patronage, 45] and stayed in Rome until 1473. He might have become a member of the papal chapel during the early years of Sixtus 4 [ASV, RL 731, 183v, cited in Merkley, Music and Patronage, 92], was a singer in the chapel of Galeazzo Maria Sforza sometime between July 1474 and March 1475 [Merkley, Music and Patronage, 101-102 and 127], and may be the composer of a chanson, Au hault de la rue, attributed to “Verjeust” in Paris, BNF, français 2245, 6v-7r [Droz, “Notes,” 187-189]. Pierre Cornuel, called Verjus (q.v.) was his nephew.
Mentionné dans éxéc. 4G1384: Jehan de le Capelle, pbre chanonne de ND de C. † 2.9.1494

Un Jehan Cornuel reçoit un habit de fou de Charles le Téméraire en 1468. Il doit bien s'agir de lui, qui se faisait appeler "Sot"
A Tours on vous nommoit Tribot
Quand vous demouries au Toucquet,
Et puis a Millan toudis Sot,
Et a Sainct-Quentin Saupicquet,
Mais a Therouanne, a ces jus,
On vous appelloit Sot toudis,
On vous nomme a Cambray Verjus
Et maistre Jehan a vo logis