The World's Earliest Music: Traced to Its Beginnings in Ancient Lands by Collected Evidence of Relics, Records, History, and Musical Instruments from Greece, Etruria, Egypt, China, Through Asyria and Babylonia, to the Primitive Home, the Land of Akkad and SumerSmith, Hermann
History
The World's Earliest Music: Traced to Its Beginnings in Ancient Lands by Collected Evidence of Relics, Records, History, and Musical Instruments from Greece, Etruria, Egypt, China, Through Asyria and Babylonia, to the Primitive Home, the Land of Akkad and Sumer
Smith, Hermann
Music -- To 500 -- History and criticism
These flutes, so slender that a breath might almost blow them away,
are undoubtedly of the type pictured in many lands in many ages, and
known as double flutes—double in the sense of being paired. I have seen
such, though of fuller proportions, represented on Egyptian _papyri_ on
walls of tombs and temples of the land of the Nile; and on the brass
plates of the palaces of Nineveh and Babylon; carved on the frieze of
the Parthenon; painted on Etruscan vases, and on the walls of Pompeii
and Herculanæum; and far away on the banks of the Petwa (a tributary of
the Ganges), sculptured on the gate of Sanchi Tope. And yet through all
these instances never have I found any evidence of the means adapted to
produce their sounds; anything that would enable one to form a distinct
judgment as to the kind of mouthpiece employed in blowing. The number
and the positions of the holes have also been involved in doubt. In
some few instances holes are to be found marked, but these might be
conventionally depicted, and could not be relied upon as guidance to
the scale of notes. Then there are the shams and indications put in by
the audacity of restorers, so that altogether the learned or academic
knowledge concerning the ancient instruments can hardly be said to have
emerged from a state of haziness.
How welcome, then, must be these Egyptian flutes, which at all events
furnish sure evidence of the position of the holes, and of a recognized
musical scale determined at a very early date in the development of
civilisation. The illustration Fig. 5 gives the relative position of
the holes and of the lengths of the flutes, which are shown here one
sixth of the actual lengths.
[Illustration: _Fig. 5._
_The Gingroi, or flutes of wailing._
_Found in
Lady Maket’s
Tomb._]
All pipes that we call _double flutes_ are represented spreading from
the mouth ʌ shaped, held both of them in the mouth, and played
one by the right hand and one by the left. All pipes of the ancients
the writers were accustomed to call flutes, not discriminating the
differences in types, being in fact unaware of the very important
distinctions as in later times perceived by specialists in musical
lore to be necessary between lip-blown instruments and reed-blown.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account