As late as 1540, we find that the principal composers and musicians in Rome were still foreigners.

To three Italians of repute, there were five Flemings, three Frenchmen, three Spaniards, one German, and one Portuguese.[204] [Footnote 204: See Baini, _Life of Palestrina_, vol.ii.p.

20.] The Flemish style of contrapuntal or figured harmony, which had enchanted Europe by its novelty and grace when Josquin Depres, in the last quarter of the fifteenth century, brought it into universal vogue, was still dominant in Italy.

But this style already showed unmistakable signs of decadence and dissolution.

It had become unfit for ecclesiastical uses, and by the exaggeration of its qualities it was tending to anarchy.