A double-canon 4 ex 2 at the upper fourth, distinguished in its unique source by its notational form: each of the two notated voices is written on a circular staff surrounding a painted red rose. As the opening composition of LonBLR 11 E.xi (preceded only by a full-page illustration which incorporates part of this work's text, as well as the full text of the following piece, Sampson's Psallite felices), Salve radix clearly serves in a dedicatory capacity of some sort. Its enigmatic text can be explained mainly by reference to the opening illustration, as a paean to the multi-flowered plant which represents the Tudor dynasty (see the Introduction to A Choirbook for Henry VIII and his Sisters).[1]

Musically, the composition belongs to a tradition of four-voice double-canon writing cultivated largely in the first decades of the 16th century.[2] Although the double-canons at the upper fourth are so restricted in terms of contrapuntal options that they all necessarily share a considerable amount of musical material, Salve radix exhibits a close relationship in particular to Josquin's En lombre dung buysonnet. The near-duplication of multi-measure passages of the latter work in Salve radix, as well as the absorption of brief melodic figures and restrictions (e.g., the lower voices change pitch breve-by-breve), indicates that this is a case of deliberate musical modeling.

On a larger scale, however, the borrowings from En lombre dung buysonnet give way to a formal structure unique to the present composition. Twelve brief polyphonic segments, delimited unambiguously by the standard staggered cadential formula employed in this type of canon, are ordered in such a way as to produce the roughly palindromic structure ABCB'A' (corresponding neatly to the work's circular notational form):

Measures:	1-8	9-27	28-32	33-49	50-63
Section:	A	B	C	B'	A'

Within this layout, the editor's contrapuntal analysis of the B and B' sections suggests a compositional intention to cause a performative "pitch spiral," in modern terms the gradual addition of flats following the cycle of fifths (B-E-A-D-G-C-F). At two points in this interpretation of the pitch material, the flatward motion ends leaving performers to continue the work a half-step lower than before, represented in the present transcription by editorial key signature changes before mm. 28 and 50 (turn on/off by selecting "View->Pitch System->Modern accidentals/signatures").

Canonic instructions: "Canon fuga In diatessaron." above each voice

Notes
[1] There is certainly no hint that the text celebrates the 1515/16 birth of Mary Tudor, as suggested in previous studies.

[2] For the compositional process and analysis summarized here, see Theodor Dumitrescu, 'Constructing a Canonic Pitch Spiral: The Case of Salve Radix', in Canons and Canonic Techniques, 14th - 16th Centuries: Theory, Practice, and Reception History. Proceedings of the International Conference, Leuven, 4-6 October 2005, ed. Katelijne Schiltz and Bonnie J. Blackburn (Leuven: Peeters, 2007), pp. 141-70.