Polyphony (Russian Orthodox liturgy)

In the Russian Orthodox liturgy of the 16th–18th centuries, polyphony (Russian: многогласие, romanized: mnogoglasiye, lit. 'many-voicing'), sometimes polyvocality,^[1] was a tradition of performing several parts of the church service in the same place at the same time; in particular, to singing several different chants simultaneously to save time. Despite being banned in favor of monophony (Russian: единогласие, romanized: edinoglasiye, lit. 'single-voicing'), i.e. singing the chants one by one consecutively, it persisted for quite some time.^[vague]