Before tracing the influence of Schütz in shaping the future course of oratorio, it will be in place to sketch the origin and development of the Passion-music. The quasi-dramatic musical presentation of the Passion[74] is even more deeply rooted in the liturgy of the Roman Church than is the oratorio. It represents the artistic amplification of the reading of the Passion of our Lord, according to the evangels as prescribed by the church during Holy Week: on Palm Sunday the Passion according to St. Matthew, on Tuesday, St. Mark, on Wednesday, St. Luke, and on Good Friday, St. John. At an early period it had become customary to assign the narrative text and the words of Christ, of the Apostles, the High Priest and other individual characters to various singers, instead of having them read. During the period of the supremacy of Gregorian plain-song this mode of rendering this part of the liturgy resulted in the Passion chant (_cantus passionis_). This continued to be the only form used until the principles of polyphony were sufficiently developed to substitute a more elaborate form. Since the year 1200 and probably much earlier, the texts to be sung were divided among three priests, called ‘Deacons of the Passion,’ as follows: one chanted the words of Christ, another the narration of the Evangelist and a third the words of the apostles, the crowd, or others whose words are recorded. Passion-music, it will be observed, is much older than the oratorio and at the time that the latter began to assume shape and coherence, it already could boast of a considerable literature. When the monodic revolution brought about the development of the oratorio along lines similar to those of opera and encouraged the use of legends of the saints and Christian allegory as text matter, the Passion remained strictly bound to its original Biblical text, although the musical treatment of certain text portions in motet form (Passion Motets) was permitted. Not until the second half of the seventeenth century did Passion and oratorio in Italy draw near to each other, and only in the last quarter of the century was the story of the Passion utilized for the first time as subject-matter for a great oratorio. Attilio Ariosti’s _Passione_ (1693) is probably the first work of its kind in Italy to present this subject with due dramatic emphasis and the use of musically adequate popular choruses. G. A. Perti’s _Passione_ (1685), on the other hand, is one of the type known as _sepolcros_, intended for devotional performance at a richly decorated Holy Sepulchre and serving principally as an excuse for tearfully exaggerated scenes of sorrow between Mary Magdalene and the disciples. After Ariosti’s _Passione_ Italian Passion music in its best manifestations may be said to have been taken over into the oratorio proper, with little but its text to distinguish it from the latter.