THE HISTORY OF MUSIC (art and Science) FROM THE EARLIEST RECORDS TO THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE
CHAPTER
XIII
ORGANS
Organs of two kinds were known to the ancients. One
was the Pneumatic Organ, which was blown by bellows fashioned very much in the
present style, and the second was popularly called the Hydraulic Organ (in
Greek, Hydraulis, or Hydraulikon Organon). In spite of its name, this second instrument was decidedly not
hydraulic, although it bore the appearance of being so.
The Hydraulic Organ was always an enigma to
superficial observers. They saw water bubbling up from the bottom of an open
vessel, and the water in the perpetual interchange of rise and fall, and of
rolling or tumbling about. They saw a piston working in a cylinder, and at
every stroke of the piston the water rose higher in the vessel. Hence they
concluded, naturally enough, that it was water which was undergoing the process
of injection into the pipes of this organ, and that the effects were produced
by means of that syringe-like pump. But it was simply a condensing syringe
acting upon air.
Ctesibius, the Egyptian, was the inventor, and the date of this one of the several
inventions attributed to him may be fixed within the reign of Ptolemy
Philadelphus, or between the years 284 and 246 B.C. The question may one day
arise as to whether all these were the inventions of Ctesibius,
or whether he was but the medium of communicating Egyptian science to the
Greeks.
The biographer of Philon, the cele6brated mechanician
of Byzantium, in Dr. W. Smith’s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, has relied upon a statement by Athenaeus, that Ctesibius flourished in the reign of Ptolemy Euergetes II. He
has therefore dated three important men in the history of science a full
century or more too near to our own times, viz., Ctesibius,
Philon, and Heron of Alexandria. Athenaeus was undoubtedly mistaken when he
wrote Euergetes II. It should have been Euergetes I; but, as he was recounting an historical event
of five hundred years before his own time, Athenaeus was liable to such slips. Euergetes I succeeded Ptolemy Philadelphus, but the
invention of the organ must be referred to the earlier of the two reigns.
An epigram, by Hedylus,
fixes the date conclusively, and a copy of this epigram is included in Athenaeus’s
own book. He must therefore have forgotten it when he wrote Euergetes II. Hedylus therein alludes to the temple of Arsinoe,
to the Hydraulic Organ, and to Ctesibius as its
inventor. This Hedylus was the rival of Callimachus,
who was librarian to Ptolemy Philadelphus, or Ptolemy II. Upon the authority of Hedylus, or even upon that of the epigram alone,
without the name of its author, there can be no reasonable doubt as to the date
of Ctesibius. No one would be found to pay homage to
the deceased Arsinoe, as to a divinity, after her brother-husband’s death.
VARIOUS MEANINGS OF ORGAN.
There is often a difficulty as to the precise meaning
of the word organ in Greek and in Latin, when it is unaccompanied by further
explanation. Any simple mechanical invention, musical or otherwise, was an
organ. Ordinarily, the best translation is the first of those given by Liddell
and Scott, an instrument; for it might be a surgical instrument; or it might be
a musical instrument, such as a simple pipe; or even an organ of sense, as the instrument of reasoning, or of
other power. Vitruvius draws a distinction between an organ and a machine, as
that a machine requires the labour of several
persons, or a greater exertion of power by one than is required for an organ;
whereas all the powers of an organ may be exhibited, without any especial
exertion, by one alone. It is not, therefore, to be inferred, as it has been by
some musical writers, that a Greek organon, or a Latin organum,
must necessarily mean a musical instrument; but rather that every manufactured
musical instrument might be included under the designation
of organon.
The first full description of the Hydraulic Organ is
by Heron of Alexandria, who was a pupil of its inventor, Ctesibius. Ctesibius seems to have flourished only some fifty
years after the conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great; and, not only in that
century, but even long after it, all who desired to obtain a thorough knowledge
of art or science, such as no European teachers could impart, sought to place
themselves under Egyptian masters. Philon, the mechanician of Byzantium, the
site of Constantinople, must also have been to some extent, if not altogether,
a pupil of Ctesibius. In his Belopoiika he
speaks of Ctesibius in the past tense, as having
resided in Alexandria, and of his having explained to him the nature of air,
and especially its elasticity. He refers also to several inventions by Ctesibius, and, among them, to the Hydraulic Organ. Philon
defines it as a kind of syrinx played by the hands, which we call hydraulis; and he adds, that the kind of bellows, by
which the pnigeus, or air-condenser, was filled with
air, was made of copper. It was, in fact, nothing more than a condensing
syringe, which is just the opposite of the modern air-pump, or exhausting
syringe; for the first pumps air into a receiver, and the second withdraws the
air. The Egyptians had for ages before employed small syringes for injecting
embalming fluids into the bodies of the dead.
The second full description of the Hydraulic Organ is
by Vitruvius Pollio, in his discursive treatise upon Architecture. The date of
this treatise is stated to be between B.C. 20 and 11. Although there have been
numberless commentators upon the works of Heron and of Vitruvius, the Hydraulic
Organ has not been sufficiently explained, and does not seem even now to be
fully understood.
I argue thus, from still reading Athenaeus’s erroneous
description quoted by an eminent scholar, in one of the latest English books.
Thus, currency is given to the fable of the pipes having been bent down into
water, and the water being pounded by an
attendant. From this it is evident that the mistake of Athenaeus has not yet
been satisfactorily proved.
Athenaeus knew nothing except by hearsay about the
Hydraulic Organ, for he goes so far as to assert that it was debated whether it
ought to be classed among wind or stringed instruments. If he had understood
its construction, he would have ridiculed such a discussion.
Neither Sir John Hawkins nor Dr. Burney, our two recognised musical historians, has rendered any assistance
towards correcting the error of Athenaeus they give up the instrument as incomprehensible. Neither does the Hydraulic
Organ seem to be better understood in Germany than in England, if an opinion
may be formed from the labours of one of the latest
exponents of the musical instruments of the ancients. In a work of such a
class, some special study of the subject might reasonably be expected, but Herr
Volkmann informs his readers that the pipes of the organ were filled with air
through the compression of water enclosed in a bronze receiver, which water
boys were stirring about. Also, that the organ was played upon with difficulty,
and with considerable exertion. As to the difficulty of performing upon the
instrument, Herr Volkmann seems to have mistaken the labours of the bellows-blower for those of the organist. The organ itself was of very
light touch, and the labour of filling it with air
fell upon the attendants. As to the compression of water, the learned writer
must be understood to mean compression of air by water, which is not over-clearly expressed. The boys did but pump in air; and the
air was enclosed under a receiver, into which water had free ingress and
egress. Water is practically incompressible.
I shall have occasion to explain the principle of the
instrument hereafter, and will now only adduce the evidence of Claudian, as an
eye-witness to the lightness of the touch.
In one of his poems, Claudian lauds the organist as “He
who, sending forth powerful rolling sounds by his light touch, can cause the
countless tones, which spring from the graduated multitude of bronze pipes, to
resound to his wandering finger; and who, by a beam-like lever, can arouse from
their depths the struggling waters into song”.
These lines are thus versified by Dr. Busby:
With flying fingers, as they lightsome bound,
From brazen tubes he draws the pealing sound.
LIGHT TOUCH OF THE ORGAN.
Unnumbered notes the captive ear surprise,
And swell the thunder, as his art he plies :
The beamy bar is heaved! the waters wake!
And liquid lapses liquid music make.
Claudian refers to one of the large Roman organs
dating from the second to the fourth century of our era, and not to those which
existed two or three centuries before the commencement of that era. The pipes
of the earliest organs were made of large reeds, just as are those of the
Chinese at the present time, and not, at first, of bronze. But, from Claudian’s description, it appears that the touch of the
large Roman organs was equally light; and, indeed, there is no reason that it
should have been otherwise, for the key-action of the one must have answered
equally well for the other.
One of the ablest commentators upon the Hydraulic
Organ, in modern times, is Isaac Vossius, in
his De Poematum Cantu, et viribus Rhythmi, printed at Oxford in 1673. In this work
he gives a partial description of the organ of Vitruvius, and supplies many of
the quotations which have since been constantly reappearing in the works of
later commentators. During the eighteenth century, perhaps the ablest treatise
on the subject was that of Albert Meister, in 1771. It is mainly copied from Vossius. Gottlob Schneider, in his careful edition of
Vitruvius, supplied much that was desired towards a correct text of his author,
but he does not explain the principle of the organ.
The comments of Vossius, of
Albert Meister, and many others, were published before the Histories of Burney
and of Hawkins. Dr. Burney, remarking upon them, says: But neither the
description of the Hydraulic Organ in Vitruvius, nor the conjectures of his
innumerable commentators, have put it into the power of the modems either to
imitate or perfectly to conceive the manner of its construction. And Sir John
Hawkins says: So imperfectly has Vitruvius described it, that to understand his
meaning has given infinite trouble and vexation to many a learned commentator.
And again, after publishing the Latin text of Vitruvius, from a copy not
over-carefully collated, Hawkins adds: This description to every modern reader
must appear unintelligible.
I cannot admit the existence of any such extraordinary
difficulties. The descriptions are troublesome, as I found when scrutinizing
that of Heron; but it sufficed for me, after some reflection, to make an
experimental Hydraulic Organ, and it answers perfectly. That which is now more
wanted than a new translation is an explanation of the principle of the
instrument, and I do not doubt but that I can make it intelligible henceforth
to everyone who may indulge a wish to understand it. A mass of learning has hitherto
been expended upon it without any very adequate result.
PRINCIPLE OF THE HYDRAULIC ORGAN.
If only a thoroughly good translation of Heron were
wanted, there could not be, so far as I am able to judge, a better than the one
included in the English edition of Heron’s Pneumatika, or Spiritalia, published in 1851.
The translation is by Mr. J. G. Greenwood, Fellow of University College,
London. Manuscripts must have been carefully collated for the text of that
edition.
The principle of the Hydraulic Organ is both simple
and ingenious, but it is one no longer in use. To this fact we may trace, at
least, one reason why it has not hitherto been generally understood.
I have already said that the name hydraulic is, at
least in the modern view, incorrect. There is not one water-pipe in the
instrument they are all for air. The Greeks were not far advanced in science when the
public gave it this name. The earliest description is in a Greek work on
Pneumatics.
The ingenious application of water was but to prevent
the possibility of over-blowing the instrument, and thus to save it from the
destruction to which the Pneumatic Organ was always liable from that particular
cause. Such an improvement was, no doubt, the principal reason for the superior
popularity of the Hydraulic over the Pneumatic Organ for many centuries. A
second advantage in the Hydraulic Organ was, that the condensing syringe for
injecting air took up less space than the Egyptian-shaped bellows, which were
trodden by the feet, and which the sculptured Pneumatic Organs on the Obelisk
of Theodosius prove to have been continued in use by the Romans down to the
fourth century of our era.
The apparatus for supplying wind to the Hydraulic
Organ acted vertically, and not horizontally, as it would in bellows. The
upright condensing syringe was worked by a lever from below. It pumped in wind,
but no water. It injected air very spasmodically, on account of the elasticity
of air, and as a syringe it could act only at intermittent intervals. The
distribution of the air was then equalized, and the supply to the pipes was
maintained by the pressure of water returning to seek its level under the bronze
receiver, from which it had been previously expelled by the air. The receiver
was open at the bottom, and, according to Vitruvius, its edges were supported
by wedges. Thus the water had free ingress and egress. It is a well-known fact
that the pressure of water is alike in all directions, so that it must act
equally well upwards or downwards.
The law is that liquids transmit pressure equally in
all directions, and the pressure they produce by their own weight is
proportionate to the depth.
And now, for exemplification, take a glass funnel, and
turn the broad end downwards in a pan of water. Put a cork under the funnel,
and it will float upon the surface of the water. If you then cover the smaller
end of the funnel with your lips and blow down it, you will see the cork sink
gradually to the bottom of the pan. When it has arrived there, all the water
will have been expelled from under the funnel, and, instead of water, it will
be filled by the breath from your mouth. The water which you have driven out
will necessarily mix with, and raise the height of the outer water, which is
around the funnel, in the pan. If you then continue to blow, your breath will
only rise in bubbles from the bottom of the pan to the surface of the water.
The elastic force of the increased quantity of air within the funnel has become
too great to be further condensed by that insufficient weight of water.
Now, suddenly remove your lips, and put a tiny organ
pipe, or whistle, into the neck of the funnel, covering the pipe round with india rubber, or a cork, to make it fit into the neck. As
the pressure from your mouth is now withdrawn, and there is a hole through the
pipe which permits the escape of the air, the water will return, and in
returning under the funnel to seek its level, it will drive up the air that has
been enclosed, through the pipe. In doing this it will keep up a continuous
sound from the pipe just as if it were blown from the lips. The pressure of the
water will continue until it has found its level within as without. The water
exercises the pressure of its weight upon the air, and the higher the water in
the pan, the greater will be that weight. There is hardly a limit to the
compressibility and to the elasticity of air, (as witnessed in the pop-gun, and
in the air-gun,) but water is not practically compressible, and therefore is
not elastic. It exercises only its weight.
This is the simple secret of the pnigeus or air-compressor of the Hydraulic Organ. It is evident from it that the
Egyptian inventor understood the compressibility and the elastic power of air,
as well as that the pressure of water is equal in all directions.
We may note also an advantage in this system of
causing water to return to seek its own level under a solid open receiver. It
thus becomes a more powerful agent than if the same amount of water were
equally distributed as a weight upon the top of a drum-shaped, receiver having
elastic sides, because the water expelled from the pnigeus will raise the height of that in the pan or outer vessel, and the weight of
water is proportionate to its depth.
But the pnigeus, or
air-compressor of the organ, had two pipes at the top instead of the one of the
funnel, and being made of bronze instead of glass, it was impossible to see
into it, as through the glass of the funnel. Suppose, then, that instead of a
funnel, you use as an air-condenser a large pewter basin, inverted in a pan of
water, and, near to the circular rim, which would support the basin if it were
upright, let there be two holes on opposite sides. The first hole is for the
insertion of a pliable tube to communicate with the syringe by which the air is
to be injected into this condenser, and the second hole is for a somewhat
smaller tube, to carry air from this condenser into the organ. If the wind be
then injected into the condenser, it cannot escape through the second tube until
a key of the organ has been put down, to allow it to pass, and, in passing, to
sound a pipe. The only means of knowing whether this condensing receiver is
well supplied with air, is to continue blowing until bubbles rise from the
bottom of the pan to the surface of the water. Then as much air is inclosed as the pressure of the water will retain. If
greater loudness be required from the pipes, it is only necessary to take a
deeper, receiver, and to add more water in order to increase the weight upon
the enclosed air. Under any circumstances, the only way to make sure of having
a supply of air in readiness is to see the bubbles rise outwards.
If the pewter basin were deeper, and it were made of
copper or bronze, as was the Greek pnigeus which was used for this purpose, it would resemble a caldron, and the bubbling
up of the water from the bottom would, to a superficial observer, strengthen
the idea that it was really a caldron, and that the water was boiling.
To that appearance we may attribute the Latin name
of cortina (the caldron), given to
the Hydraulic Organ, as, for instance, in the poem of Aetna, of which a superior text has recently been edited,
from a Cambridge manuscript, by Mr. H. A. J. Munro, late Professor of Latin in
that University.
In the sequel of this book, if it should extend to the
Middle Ages, more allusions will be found to the supposed boiling of the water,
to make the pipes sound; one, even of as late a date as the twelfth century, in
the writings of William of Malmesbury.
It should be added that this pnigeus,
or air-condenser, was placed within a pedestal, made in the form of a small
altar, being either rounded and like a very short column, or hexagonal with its
base in steps. The tops of altars were hollowed out, to prevent the spread of
fire, and the pnigeus was a sort of extinguisher for
it. The water in the outer rim or basin of the condenser was kept incessantly
tossing up and down, because it rose at every fresh injection of air into the
condenser, and it fell again at every emission of that air through the smaller
tube into the organ, whenever the organist touched a key. This accounts for the
toiling and labouring of the water so often referred,
to, as by Tertullian and others.
The foregoing full explanation of the air-condenser,
air-compresser, or pnigeus,
has perhaps been demanded, because this contrivance of ancient science is no
longer in use, but the condensing syringe, which supplied the place of the
ordinary bellows, acted so much like an ordinary condensing syringe of today,
that, except perhaps as to the position of the valve, it will be better
understood by a glance at a diagram, than, from any number of words.
The question then arises as to which of the diagrams
is to be offered to the reader. It cannot be one copied from the small antique
designs upon medals or gems, because they are too minute to supply the details.
It may be desirable to reproduce one further on, not only for the sake of the
true external appearance of the Hydraulic Organ, but also for the purpose of
presenting to the enquiring public a portrait of one of the laurelled organists
of former days. Still, for present use, some one of the medieval designs must
be adopted, such as are found in manuscripts, or in early printed copies
of-Heron’s Pneumatika.
An objection may be raised to the one in Vetera Mathematica, and in other editions of
Heron’s work, on the following grounds. Either the artist, or the engraver, has
so rounded off the ends of tubes, and the mouths of cylinders, in order to
improve the picture according to his ideas of the beautiful, and yet, so little
in accordance with the description in the text, that, instead of elucidating,
they only tend to mystify the subject. The worthy man saw that the organ was
infinitely larger than the air-compressor, and therefore he gave it a tube four
times the size of the other; and yet, in practice, the intermittent action of
the condensing-syringe would require a channel double the size of the second
tube, which had to convey a continuous and equal flow of air into the organ.
Again, he has given a pretty battledore-shaped slide under the mouth of the
organ pipe, instead of a straight one. It has at least the merit of being large
enough, but how it was to slide in a narrow groove must be a mystery to all
enquirers.
Choice is embarrassing, for each artist has had his
special proclivities. I have adopted the diagram in the Harleian manuscript,
No. 5605, and, ceteris paribus, I was perhaps a little influenced
in the choice by a curious exhibition of idiosyncrasy on the part of the good
monk who must be supposed to have designed it. It appears that he could not
induce his pious fingers to draw a heathen altar as a support for anything, and
therefore he left the pnigeus dangling in the air.
Our less scrupulous artist has supplied the stand, but the reader must not
expect to find anything of the kind in the manuscript.
No one of these diagrams is of any authority, the
oldest extant copy of the Pneumatikanot being older than the fourteenth or fifteenth century. The text is the one and
only reliable source for elucidation.
It may be well to note that the condensing syringe, or
wind pump, must be understood as being detached from the organ; for, in this
design, it looks very much as if it were under it; moreover, the condensing
syringe, or wind-pump, as here represented, is of most unnecessary grandeur for
so small an air-compressor, or pnigeus.
Instead of the tedious series of three or four
letters, one for every angle of each part to be described, I have substituted
the names, which seem to be quite sufficient for an intelligent reader. The
lever by which the condensing syringe, or wind-pump, is worked explains itself.
The little valve to admit air is at the top of the syringe, in the small box
above the shoulder of the larger cylinder in which the piston works. It falls
to a restricted distance by its own weight when the piston is down, and so it
admits air; and it is closed by the rush of air from below when the piston is
suddenly forced upwards. That valve added greatly to the labour of blowing. The most important of subsequent improvements in the Hydraulic
Organ was in the form and character of the valve. Instead of being flat, as
here, it was made like a cymbal, or of a bell-shape, so as to catch the wind
from below more readily. Again, its weight was balanced from the outside, by
hanging this bell-shaped valve to a little chain, which was held in the mouth
of a dolphin shaped balance. The dolphin moved upon a centre-pin,
and his head went down or up with the bell. So he took off the weight of the
valve, and looked like a dolphin sporting. Thus, too, the popular idea of the
agency of water was further promoted.
And now as to the key-action of the organ. The diagram
is here enlarged in order to show more plainly the little key with three bent
arm. It will be seen that, when the key is pressed down at its upper extremity
by the finger, it will cause the lid of the box to slide on, so as to close it,
and thus to bring the little round hole in the lid under the mouth of the pipe,
and admit air to it. The box ought to have been inverted, the mouth of the pipe
fitted into it, and the slide should act below, instead of above, but then the
action could not have been seen.
The box should also have been exceedingly shallow, so
as only to take in hautboy reeds, and the lid to slide as in a box for dominos.
The shallower the box, the quicker would the pipe speak. The slide is the one
important part, and that alone is spoken of by later writers. The wind-chest of
the organ included an air-channel under these slides.
Wien the finger was raised from the key, there was a
piece of string, like the tape in a modern pianoforte action, to bring back the
key into its place. The string was attached to a spring secured to the case,
and this spring was made of elastic horn. It will be seen in the diagram acting
upon the lower end of the vertical arm of the key. The action is very simple.
The key turns upon a centre-pin, like two spokes of a
wheel upon its axle.
It has been argued that the Greeks had no keys to
their organs, because such a word as kleis,
which would express the key to a fastening or lock, is not named in connection
with musical instruments. But it should be remembered that we employ the
English word idiomatically. Even in Latin, Vitruvius uses pinna for an
organ-key for playing upon the instrument, and would only adopt such a word
as clavis for a key in the literal
sense, if it were to lock up the instrument.
The hydraulic action of modem organs does not bear any
resemblance to the ancient. The object of the present hydraulic action is only
to diminish the weight of the touch.
THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE HYDRAULIC ORGAN.
The following is the invention of Ctesibius,
as described by Heron of Alexandria. I give a free translation, because it will
save trouble to all readers. For instance, a word like kanon is
here used in half-a-dozen different senses. Any straight rod, beam, pole, or
rule of any kind is a kanon, besides its
other meanings. Here, it is at one time a piston-rod; next, the beam of a
lever; thirdly, the fulcrum upon which the lever works; fourthly, it is a part
of the case within the organ. To give at once its precise name saves the reader
the trouble of gathering from the description what kind of kanon is there intended. The most tiresome part
of all indefinite or technical descriptions is the summing up of an author’s
words to find out his meaning.
Herons’ Pneumatika, or Spiritalia, has not been
reprinted in Greek for the last two centuries, therefore, that part of the work
which contains the description of the Hydraulic Organ is now freed from
abbreviations, and subjoined in modern types. The only exception is, as to the
three letters, koppa, sampi,
and stigma, which are only here employed to denote parts of the
instrument, and therefore do not give any trouble :
Let there be a small altar-like pedestal of bronze,
containing water. In the water let there be a convex hemisphere, called a pnigeus, retaining a free passage for water underneath it.
From and through the top of this pnigeus, let two
tubes be carried above the pedestal; one of them bending downwards outside the
pedestal, and communicating with the box of a condensing syringe having its
mouth downwards, and its inner surface made smooth and true to fit a piston.
Let the piston be well fitted into this box, or cylinder, so that no air may
escape by its side, and to the piston attach a very strong piston-rod. Again,
to this piston-rod attach a transverse rod, which shall act as a centre-pin (at v), and work as a lever upon an upright
fulcrum which must be firmly set.
Into the inverted bottom of the box above described
insert another box of small size, with its mouth quite open to the larger, but
closed above, and having a hole through the upper part, by which air may enter
into the larger box. But under this hole let there be a thin plate to close it,
and let this plate be upheld by pins passing through small holes made in it,
and these pins are to have heads, so that the plate may not fall off. Such a
plate is called a valve (platusmation).
The second tube from the top of the pnigeus is to be carried up to communicate with the
transverse channel [included in the wind-chest of the organ]. Into this
transverse channel the ends of the organ pipes are inserted, and have their
extremities enclosed in little boxes, such as are made to hold hautboy reeds.
The orifices of the organ pipes are left open within them.
The lids of these boxes are to slide over the orifices
of the organ pipes, and they must have holes made in them, so that when the
sliding lids are pushed home, the holes in them may correspond with the
orifices of the organ pipes; but when the sliding lids are drawn back, they
will pass over these orifices and close the pipes.
Now, if the lever be depressed at its extremity the
piston will be raised, and thus expel the air which is enclosed in the box of
the cylinder, and the force of that air will close the hole in the little box
above it, through its action upon the aforesaid valve. The air can then pass
out only through the first tube, and so into the pnigeus;
again, out of the pnigeus, along the second tube,
into the wind-chest of the organ; lastly, out of the wind-chest of the organ
into the pipes, if the orifices in the pipes and the holes in the sliding lids
coincide and that is, when the lids, or some of them, are pushed home.
Therefore, in
order that, when we wish any of the pipes to sound, their orifices may be open,
and that, when we wish them to cease, these orifices may be shut, we may do as
follows:
[The Action of the Key.] Suppose one of the reed-boxes to be separated from the rest, the open part
of its sliding lid being δ; the organ pipe above it being ε; the entire slide that fits below the organ pipe being ςρ; and the hole in that slide which is to correspond with the orifice of the
organ pipe being η. Then let
there be a key with three little bent arms to it, of which the arm is attached
to the above-named slide, and the key to turn upon a centre-pin
at μ2.
If we depress with the hand the highest arm of the key
in the direction of the open part of the slide (δ), we shall push the slide inwards, and when it has reached the end of the
box, the hole in the lid will correspond with the orifice of the organ pipe.
In order that, when we withdraw the hand, the slide
may also be withdrawn mechanically, and thus close the communication with the
pipe, do as follows:
Rather lower than the reed-boxes, but at the level of,
and parallel to, the wind-chest, let a rod (υ4 υ6) be
carried along, and to this rod fix slips of horn, elastic and curved, one of
which (υ6) is
opposite to the reed-box (δγ).
From the top of this piece of horn let a catgut
string, well secured to it, be carried round the extremity of the key (θ), [the point of the lower angle of the key,] so that, when the sliding lid
is pushed in the opposite direction, the string may be tightened. Then, if we
depress the upper part of the key at its extremity (υ2), we drive home the lid of the box, and the string draws after it the end
of the piece of horn, so as to straighten it by this traction.
But when the hand is withdrawn from the key, the horn,
by returning to its original form, draws back the slide away from the mouth of
its box, so as to overlap and cover up the hole in the end of the organ pipe.
A contrivance of this kind being applied to the
box under each of the pipes, when we wish some of the pipes to sound, we must
press with the fingers the key of each; and when we do not wish them to sound,
we withdraw the fingers, and then the pipes from which the slides are drawn
away will cease to sound.
[The Principle of the Instrument.] Water is poured into the stand in order that the superabundant air, I mean that which, when driven out of the cylinder, raises the height of
the water in the stand may be
retained within the pnigeus, so that the pipes shall
always have a supply in readiness to enable them to be sounded.
When the piston (ρσ) is raised, it drives the air out of the cylinder, as already explained,
into the pnigeus; and when the piston is depressed,
it opens the valve in the little box above it, by which means the cylinder is
refilled with air from without. So that, when the piston is again forced up, it
will again drive air into the pnigeus.
It is better that the piston-rod (τυ) should work round a centre-pin at τ [where it joins the lever], and this by means of a ring in the bottom of
the piston-rod, through which the centre-pin [formed
by the end of the lever-rod] must pass, in order that the piston may not be
twisted, but rise and fall vertically.
Between the age of Heron and that of Vitruvius, there
is not perhaps any extant notice of the Hydraulic Organ which will throw
additional light upon its construction. The description of Vitruvius is ample
for those who have some previous knowledge of the instrument; but it has the
fault of being too briefly expressed to be intelligible to others who have not
had that experience. It is evident, from the concluding passage of his chapter,
that Vitruvius did not anticipate any better result from his labours. At least four attempts have been made to translate
his work into English, but all have failed at this point. The last two are by
Newton and Gwilt. Newton leaves the hard words as they stand in the original,
trusting that their meanings may be discovered by the reader. He writes of the little
cistern which supports the head of the machine, instead of the wind-chest of
the organ, and of brass buckets with movable pistons. The late Joseph Gwilt,
who was learned in music of the Madrigalian era, has
nevertheless misconceived the Hydraulic Organ. He translates manubreis ferreis with
iron finger-boards, (instead of with iron handles,) although, in the next line,
these handles are to be turned round.
For these reasons, the first object of a new attempt
should be to write so explicitly as to make it possible that every one may
understand. I therefore amplify the description of Vitruvius, and appeal rather
to his words, to justify the construction I have put upon them, than offer such
a literal translation as may hereafter be made by any one, with the assistance
of the paraphrase. The sentences of Vitruvius are exceedingly long and
interwoven, and I have therefore divided them into parts. Further than this Vitruvius having two condensing syringes, or wind-pumps, to his organ
instead of one, describes each part of them in the plural number. He thus
complicates his explanations ; but as the two are alike, it suffices to
describe one, and to reserve plurals for parts of that one.
The accompanying diagram is mainly a copy from one
made by Isaac Vossius for his De Poematum Cantu et Viribus Rhythmi. Vossius’s dolphins
are made to work by the tail instead of by the bead, because the text that he
followed had ex oere, instead
of ex ore. He therefore referred those words to the cymbals; but as
cymbals were invariably of metal, the addition of ex oere would have been superfluous. Isaac Vossius understood the instrument, but as he was treating
upon another subject, he did not complete his explanation. Again, he wrote in
Latin, like Vitruvius, and so he left some technical difficulties which neither
Dr. Burney nor Sir John Hawkins1 could master.
THE HYDRAULIC ORGAN DESCRIBED BY VITRUVIUS.
But I will not omit to touch, as briefly as possible,
upon the plan of the Hydraulic Organ, and to express, as well as I can in
writing, the principle of its construction.
A bronze altar-shaped pedestal is set upon a basis of
timber.
Upon this same basis are straight bars of wood, shaped
like the sides of ladders, and erected both on the right and on the left of the
pedestal. The bronze cylinders of two condensing syringes, (one on each side,)
are maintained in an erect position by these bars. Each of these cylinders has
a movable piston, which has been carefully turned by the lathe. The piston has
an iron elbow-joint fixed into its centre [at the
lower end]. The vertical arm of this elbow is formed by the piston-rod; and the
horizontal arm by a lever, the end of which passes through the handle of the
piston-rod, and thus becomes the centre-pin by which
the piston-rod is raised or depressed. It is covered with unshorn sheepskin [to
prevent noisy action].
In the top of each of the cylinders is a circular
hole, of about the size to admit three fingers; and immediately above this hole
is a bronze dolphin, which is balanced upon a centre-pin
passing through its middle. The dolphin holds in its mouth a little chain,
which is attached to a small convex metal cymbal, with a flat edge or margin
[like a modem cymbal]. The cymbal is hidden within the cylinder, [it being just
below the hole so that the first puff of air from below will cause it to stop
the hole].
And now, as to the altar-shaped pedestal. In the upper
part, where water is maintained, is the air-condenser, called pnigneus, which is of a convex form, like an inverted
funnel. Under the pnigeus are wedges, which, in
height, are, about equal to the breadth of three fingers, and they maintain a
free space below, for the passage of the water between the lower edges of the pnigeus and the bottom of the vessel.
Above the neck of the pnigeus is the wind-chest for all the pipes, which sustains the upper part of the
organ. The wind-chest is called in Greek The regulator of the music (Canon musicus).
In the wind-chest are air-channels running
longitudinally; four air-channels if for four stops; six for six stops; and
eight for an eight-stopped organ.
Each of these longitudinal air-channels is shut in by
its stop, which is worked by an iron handle. When one of the handles is turned
round, it admits air from the wind-chest into that channel or groove. These
air-channels have transverse holes in them, which open into corresponding holes
above in the table-board, or sound-board of the organ, which is called in Greek
“The Register-table” (pinax).
Sliders are interposed between this register-table and
the wind-chest; and these sliders are pierced through with holes which
correspond in size with the transverse holes above-named. The sliders are
oiled, in order that they may easily be pushed in and withdrawn.
These sliders are for stopping the holes, and they are
technically called “The Plinths”, as each forms a kind of basement to an organ
pipe. (Plinthides.) Their sliding in and out
will one way open, and the other way will close the holes that have been bored
for air-passages.
These sliders have iron conductors fixed to them, and
connected with the keys of the organ. Then, the touching of a key will cause a
corresponding movement of its slider.
On the upper side of the before-named register-table
are the holes through which the air must make its egress from the air-channels
into the pipes. These holes have rings fixed in them, into which rings the
orifices of all the pipes are inserted.
And now, to revert to the cylinder of the condensing
syringe. Each cylinder has a tube running from it to connect it with the pnigeus, in which the air is condensed, and out of the pnigeus through its neck, (which is formed by a short
tube,) up to the orifice of the wind-chest, over which orifice a well-turned
valve is placed. When the wind-chest has received its supply of air, this valve
closes the orifice, and does not permit the air to return.
Now, to go back to the lever. When the handle is
raised, it depresses the elbow-joint of the piston, which is at its opposite
extremity, and thus it brings down the piston of the air-cylinder to its lowest
point. Then the dolphin which, as before said, is set upon a centre-pin, lowers the cymbal which hangs from its mouth,
and thus refills the cylinder with air.
On the other hand, when the lever raises the
piston-rod, and the piston is worked with vigorous frequency, it closes the
hole above the cymbal, and then the enclosed air is driven, by the pressure of
the piston, into the tube. Through the tube the air passes into the pnigeus, and from the pnigeus,
through the second tube, into the wind-chest. By continued vigorous movement of
the lever, the air being frequently compressed, it flows through the apertures
left open by the organ stops, and refills the air-channels that are included in
the wind-chest with air.
Therefore, when the keys of the organ are touched by
the hands, they, continually propel and bring back the sliders, alternately
closing and opening the holes. Thus, by the art of music, these pipes send
forth their resounding tones, with manifold varieties of modulations.
I have endeavoured, to the
best of my ability, to explain this obscure subject in writing; but it is not
an easy matter. Neither will this explanation be intelligible to all, beyond
those who have had some practice in things of this kind. But if they can
understand but little from this description, yet, when they know the thing
itself, they will certainly cap. 13.) find every part of it to be curiously and
ingeniously arranged.
From the above it will he evident that there were
organs with four, six, and eight stops before the birth of Christ; and, as a
consequence, that they had different qualities of tone. The reed principle was
so fully understood, and so much in favour, that its
application to the organ cannot reasonably be doubted. Organ pipes must have
had sliders to close or open them, and when there was any music worthy of the
name, these sliders could only have been managed by the fingers acting upon
keys.
Before parting with Vitruvius, a few words may be said
about the metal vessels fixed in open spaces among the seats, or otherwise near
to the audience, in Greek theatres, which vessels he describes in his fifth
book.- They were an ingenious and scientific contrivance for assisting both
voice and instrument, and the principle upon which they were constructed may be
thus familiarly explained.
It is a well-known fact that, when a harp and a
pianoforte are in the same room, and in precise tune together, a chord struck
upon the pianoforte will produce a corresponding chord from the harp. The
sound-waves that the pianoforte has set into vibration have reached the strings
of the harp, and they have sufficient power to excite new sounds in unison with
them, from the tightly drawn strings of the harp. The effect will be the same
with two pianofortes if the dampers are up, and with other instruments. This
principle was well understood by the ancients. It is referred to both by
Aristotle and by Aristides Quintilianus. It differs, from echo, which is but a
reverberation of one sound. The main body of sound travels like a billiard
ball, and it will either be returned or deflected according to the angle at
which it strikes the object.
The Greek vessels in theatres were for the purpose of
utilizing this waste power. The sound-waves that were acting upon the ear of
the listener were at the same instant exciting new waves of sound from another
body, by setting it also into vibration as a sound-board, when they would
otherwise have been deflected, or had travelled away.
The vessels must have had either a contracted edge or
lip, or else a hole in them. Sound may be produced from air set in vibration by
the edge of a reed, as in a pandaean pipe; or from
the lip of a phial, or from the hole in a flute; but no sound will ensue from
blowing into a tea-cup. In that case the breath will only be deflected. It
requires the strong friction of a wet finger round the edge of a tea-cup, or of
a finger-glass, to set so wide-mouthed a body into vibration.
The vessels thus set round the theatre were tuned to
the different notes of scales, even to quarter-tones, because each vessel could
produce but one note. It is strange that this scientific contrivance should not
have been utilized in any way by the modems, with the well-known fact of the
harp and pianoforte before them. Surely it is preferable to reverberation, both
from its adding power, and from its simultaneousness.
About eighty, years after Vitruvius wrote,
improvements were made, or attempted, in the Hydraulic Organ, but the nature of
those improvements is nowhere explained. Suetonius reports of the Emperor Nero
that, having finished a consultation hurriedly when his enemies were
approaching, he passed the remainder of the day in exhibiting and in discussing
the properties of Hydraulic Organs of a new kind, which he had resolved to
bring out. Just before his death, Nero vowed that, if he escaped the danger
then threatening him, he would appear upon the stage to contend for victory on
the Hydraulic Organ, on the pipe for accompanying choruses, and on the bagpipe;
also that, on the last day of the games, he would appear as an actor and as a
dancer. All these delights were lost to the Romans by his enforced suicide.
There are extant medals of the reign of this Emperor,
and of several other Roman Emperors, which were given for victories gained in
public contests of organ-playing upon the Hydraulic Organ. One such medal, of
the time of Nero, is in the British Museum, and it has on one side the head of
the Emperor, with the inscription, Imp. Nero Caesar Aug. P. Max. The letters
are, as usual, in capitals, without stops between them. If in full, it would
have been, Imperator Nero, Caesar Augustus, Pontifex Maximus. He was indeed a
strange specimen for a high priest. On the reverse of the medal is the portrait
of the victorious organist, and the inscription, Laurenti nica, (The victory of Laurentius). The victor stands
beside his organ, with a branch of laurel raised high in his right hand. Laurel
is upon the front of the organ, and on the further side from the organist also
are two branches, where one of the condensing syringes should be. The limit of
space did not permit the introduction of either of the condensing syringes into
the medal.
There are other such medals of the reigns of the
Emperors Trajan, Caracalla, and Valentinian, in the same collection. The
last-named has the inscription Placeas Petri. In that we have a side view of the organist who is seated, and of
two organ blowers who are working at the condensing syringes, one on each side
of the organ. A front row of nineteen pipes is to be seen; but, in all such
cases, the number of pipes has been restricted by want of space. Engravings
from medals of the same class, and copied from coins which are extant in
foreign cabinets, are depicted in Description General des Medallions contorniates, by J. Sabatier. In describing one of the
time of the Emperor Trajan, Sabatier has mistaken the laurel of the victor for
a flabellum.
In spite of these medals being contorniate,
or having an outer rim turned by the lathe, and raised to protect them, they
are much worn, and consequently indistinct. They are all seemingly of copper,
which is much softer than bronze. For this reason, I select an example from an
antique gem. It is a cornelian intaglio, formerly in the Hertz Collection, and
now in the British Museum. As it would be too minute to be distinct if
exhibited in the gem size of the original, it has been enlarged by our artist.
He could not determine the character of the ornament upon the pedestal of the
organ, but Mr. Murray, of the British Museum, has since kindly informed me that
it is a wreath of laurel, and should have been carried round the centre of the pedestal. The gem seems to have been intended
for the finger, being nearly the length of a finger-joint. It was found to be
too narrow to admit of the portrait of the organist by the side of his
indispensable organ, if the organ blowers were to have their share of fame, and
therefore he has been exhibited in full face above it. It is to be regretted
that we cannot ascertain the name of this eminent artist, but even his initials
are not to be deciphered. The medal is peculiar in exhibiting the victor in a
nude state, but it has this advantage, that we may now admire his ribs and his
collar bone, as well as his good-humoured face. So
great a celebrity deserves something more than a mere bust.
The two organ blowers have, one the lever up and the
other down; thus to work alternately, and so to diminish the spasmodic
injection of the air. The portrait of the before-named victor, Laurentius, may
be seen in Dr. William Smith’s Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, (under Hydraula). A third organist,
but one looking more like a woman than a man, is exhibited on another coin of
Nero, and by the side of that organ is a horn-blower, with a curved horn made
of metal, and of the largest size a very base instrument. The horn is curved
over the player’s shoulder, and it passes under his arm, to his mouth. A spear
crosses the circle described by the horn, and is seemingly there placed for the
purpose of steadying the horn.
Tertullian, the most ancient of the Latin Fathers of
the Church, and who flourished in and after the end of the second century,
compares the soul of man to the Hydraulic Organ. As the soul animates the human
body, and acts in every part of it, so does the wind which fills the organ.
Behold, says he, the highly portentous and munificent
bequest of Archimedes, I mean the
Hydraulic Organ. So many members of that body, so many parts, so many joints,
so many channels for utterance, such union of different sounds, such
interchanges between time, measure, and mode, and so many rows of pipes; yet
all together form but one huge pile! So the breath, which there pants by the
tossing about of the water, will not be separated into parts, because it is
administered through parts; it remains entire in essence though divided in its
working.
Tertullian was too full of his main subject to think
twice as to whether he was ascribing the invention of the Hydraulic Organ to
the right person. He stands alone in attributing it to Archimedes. Not only his
cotemporary, Athenseus, but also Vitruvius before,
and Pliny after his time, unite in ascribing it to Ctesibius,
as do all earlier writers.
Three names were given to the sliders of the Hydraulic
Organ. First, Heron describes them as plinths to the pipes; next, Vitruvius, as
straight pieces of wood (regulae); and
Publilius Optatianiis Porphyrius, a Roman poet of the
age of Constantine I, terms them the square plectra. This was, no doubt,
from their acting like the plectra of the lyre in exciting sound, although from
pipes. The wind itself had a stronger claim to the designation of plectrum, in
an organ. These changes in the names of sliders have been a puzzle to all commentators.
As I shall not again speak of the plectrum, it is well
to notice two Latin idioms, intus canere, and foris canere. In touching the lyre with the plectrum,
the hand was projected outwards, and so away from the lyre. That was foris canere. The
fingers of the left hand were behind the strings of the lyre, and when they
were used in playing, the fingers were drawn in towards the palm of the hand
and the body of the player. That was intus canere. Hence, intus canere became proverbial for the action of a
petty thief, who would draw in anything upon which he could lay his hands, and
sometimes also for a glutton. Again, thieves were, for a like reason, hinted at
as Aspendii Citharistae,
because Aspendius was a famous performer on the lyre
and cithara, who rejected the use of a plectrum, and played upon all the
strings of the cithara with his left hand. Therefore his performances were
altogether of the intus canereclass.
Cicero compares Verres to Aspendius in one of his
orations, and Asconius comments upon the passage; but
it is desirable that the modern reader should know the position of the hands
upon the cithara in order to appreciate the two allusions.
The Hydraulic Organ forms the subject of one of the
poems of the before-named Publilius Optatianus. For some reason now unknown, he
had been banished from Rome; and, in order to be allowed to return, he
addressed a panegyric in the form of a set of short poems to the Emperor
Constantine I. This flattery was sufficiently acceptable to Constantine to
accomplish the object of the poet; and, further, it established him in the
Emperor’s favour.
Among these poems are three which are respectively
entitled An Altar, A Syrinx, and Organon, which is the Hydraulic Organ.
The last is a fanciful composition, which is intended
to resemble the form of the organ. Between twenty-six short iambics and
twenty-six hexameters a single long line runs vertically, from the top to the
bottom of the poem. This may be supposed to represent the edge of the
register-board, upon the surface of which the pipes are placed. The
twenty-six hexameter lines represent a row of pipes, and each hexameter
increases by one letter in each succeeding line, just as the pipes increase in
height. The short iambics may be designed for the body of the organ below the
register-table. It is difficult to decide whether so, or for back rows of
pipes. The pipes are described as of copper or bronze, accompanied by others of
reed. The organ is to be so powerful as to be capable of causing the hearers to
tremble. The length of the pipes is no further defined than that the smallest
is represented by twenty-five letters, and the largest by fifty, thus making
twenty-six in a row. The only guess that can be formed as to the length of the
pipes is from the allusion to the trembling of the hearers. If the organ could
cause a rumbling sensation through the body of the listener, there must have
been pipes of at least 16 feet in length, but probably longer. Cassiodorus
compares the organ to a tower, and the preceding quotation from Tertullian
represents it as a grand pile (moles). Optatian speaks of organ-blowers only in the plural number, without specifying the
precise number.
So many Roman Emperors admired the tone and the power
of the organ that, considering first the public competitions in playing, and
secondly the wealth of the empire, coupled with the luxurious extravagances of
both emperors and patricians, we may
reasonably assume at least the occasional use of the largest pipes from which
sound could be produced. There can be but little doubt as to experiments having
been made upon the largest scale. In the character of the Roman nobles, by Ammianus Marcellinus, written about the year 380, and quoted by Gibbon in
chapter XXXI, he says :
But the costly instruments of the theatre, flutes, and
enormous lyres and Hydraulic Organs are constructed for their use; and the
harmony of vocal and instrumental music is incessantly repeated in the palaces
of Rome. In these palaces sound is preferred to sense, and the care of the body
to that of the mind.
Having enlarged upon the pith of Optatian’s poem, his description of the organ may be transferred to a note. In order to
observe his self-imposed task of making each succeeding line to consist of
exactly one letter more than the former, Optatian seems to have been driven into writing quis for queis, and into
spelling rythmus instead of rhythmus.
It is assumed that M. Danjou was the first of the
moderns who counted the letters of Optatias’ verses,
and so found out their design. Attention was drawn to this fact by my learned
friend, the Chevalier E. de Coussemaker, when
discussing the difficult subject of the musical instruments of the Middle Ages in the Annales Archaeologiques of Didron, in and after the year 1844. I cannot follow M. Danjou in his further
inference that, because the letters increase in length in each hexameter
instead of decreasing, therefore the shortest pipes were on the left of the
ancient player, and he must have played the longest pipes, which form the base
of the organ, with his right hand instead of his left. There are undoubtedly
some representations of organs in that form, but they are overbalanced by
others which are not so. On the two medals of Nero’s date the one is; and the
other is not. An engraver who was not an organ player, but a spectator, would
perhaps accustom his eye to the view he had taken when facing the organist, and
so would place the long pipes on the right. The light touch and the wandering
finger were far more probably employed upon the smaller and more
quickly-speaking pipes than upon the large ones.
Again, an engraver may have thought it a matter of
indifference which view he gave of the organ, or he may have forgotten to
invert the whole of the design from right to left for a transfer to a seal or
to a die.
The poems of Optatian may he
dated in or before the year 324, because, in one of the set, he lauds Crispus,
the brave and accomplished eldest son of Constantine, who was put to death by
his jealous father in that year.
Among the remaining passages from ancient authors
which might be quoted as referring to the Hydraulic Organ, I do not observe one
which will throw further light upon the construction or the character of
the instrument, and only such are here required. I therefore pass on to the
Pneumatic Organ, or organ blown by bellows, more or less after the present
manner.
Since the bellows by which the organ was inflated are
the distinguishing feature, it may be well to show first how these ancient
bellows were worked.
In one of the tombs at Kourna is a painting of an Egyptian smithy; the smith is heating a rod of iron, and
his two assistants are blowing the bellows. These are, in every sense, pairs of
bellows, for the blower has one under each foot. He throws the weight of his
body first upon one leg, and then upon the other, drawing up the exhausted
bellows at each movement of his body by a string. This mode of action
proves that in ancient times bellows were furnished with valves, like those of
the present day; for, if otherwise, the exhausted bellows could not have been
thus drawn up by the hand. The weight of depressing, and the weight of
raising, would have been equal.
If we now turn to Herodotus, we shall find, through an
interpretation which the Lacedaemonians gave to an Oracle, that the ancient
Arcadians, the most primitive of Greeks, employed bellows of the same
character.
The Lacedaemonians had been repeatedly overcome in war
by the Tegeans, and therefore sent to the Oracle at Delphi to enquire which of
the gods they should propitiate in order to become victorious over the Tegeans.
The prophetes,
or priest, who interpreted the Oracle, judging wisely that, as the
Lacedaemonians were a brave people and had set their minds upon it, their turn
must eventually come, answered that the Lacedaemonians should become victorious
over the Tegeans. It would have been unsafe for the reputation of the Oracle
that it should predict a particular date, lest the Tegeans should still be too
strong; so the Pythian was reported to have added: When they had brought back
the bones of Orestes, the son of Agamemnon. That was indeed a safe prophecy,
for the Lacedaemonians knew absolutely less about the bones of Orestes than we
do about the bones of Moses. They could not even tell in what country Orestes
had died. If, then, the Lacedaemonians should again be beaten, although they
had brought home certain bones which they supposed to be those of Orestes, it
would be argued that the Oracle was true, and that the error was altogether on
the part of the Lacedaemonians, in having brought home the bones of the wrong
person.
A further advantage was to be gained by
the charming vagueness of the reply. It must entail a second consultation
of the Oracle; and then the brief was likely to be endorsed with a liberal
consultation fee, considering the weight of the cause, the promise of success
already made, and the desirability of propitiating the god through his
ministers.
All was wisely judged. The Lacedaemonians went a
second time to entreat further information. The priests still took care to have
plenty of loophole, for they alone could interpret the Pythian. They instructed
the Lacedaemonians to search for the bones of Orestes in the enemy’s country;
to
Seek for them where two winds with strong compulsion
are blowing,
Stroke ever answering stroke, and woe upon woe ever
growing.
This lucid exposition gave considerable occupation to
Lacedaemonian brains, but luckily there was one sagacious fellow among them,
named Lichas. He had heard from a smith, (whether
blacksmith or whitesmith is not expressed,) that being about to dig a well by
his smithy, in Tegea, he had found there the body of a man of great size, which
had been buried upon the spot. This was enough for one so acute in making
discoveries as Lichas. He hired the smithy, stole the
bones, and carried them off to Sparta. For seeing the smith’s two bellows, he
discerned in them the two winds, and in the anvil and hammer the stroke
answering to stroke, and in the iron that was being forged the woe that grew on
woe; representing that iron had been invented to the injury of man. Such
confidence did he inspire into the Lacedaemonians as to his having fulfilled the prophecy, that they were fully convinced they could
then beat the Tegeans, and so they did.
And now as to the Roman method of inflation. We may
descend to the fourth century of the Christian era, and yet we find the same
bellows employed for Pneumatic Organs, according to the sculptures upon the
Obelisk of Theodosius. This Obelisk was erected in the Hippodrome at
Constantinople, and on its white marble base are three pipers playing upon
double pipes, seven dancers, and two Pneumatic Organs, one having larger pipes
than the other.
A representation of the entire subject would exceed
the width of the present page, and the curious may see it in the Annales Archaeologiques of Didron for 1845 (p. 277). It is included in
one of the learned articles upon musical instruments, more especially those of
the Middle Ages, by M. de Coussemaker. The
representation is necessarily minute even in the quarto page of Didron; and, since one of the organs is alone required, I
have availed myself of the following woodcut of larger size from The History
of the Organ by my friends Dr. Rimbault and Mr. E. J. Hopkins, by the
kindness of Messrs. R. Cocks & Co.
These two men, or boys, ought to have strings in their
hands, and to be standing upon different bellows. All that can be said as to
this deficiency is, that the sculptor has not descended to minutiae. The boys
could be of no possible use as they are represented in the engraving.
In point of date the Pneumatic system for the organ is
probably long anterior to the Hydraulic. Heron’s work was evidently intended to
describe only such inventions as were then recent, or which had some
peculiarities not generally understood. For that reason, probably, the only
representation of the Pneumatic Organ included in his book is of one with a windmill
acting upon the piston of a condensing syringe. Thus it drives air directly
into the wind-chest of the organ, without the intermediate action of a
condenser. The pairs of bellows might not have been worked so easily by a
windmill as could a piston, but the organist would only be able to perform upon
the wind-mill-instrument when there was a sufficiently high wind.
The main difficulty in identifying the organ among
casual notices of musical instruments by Greek or Roman writers rests upon the
wide significations of organon and organum. The
organ may sometimes have been intended, even when the word syrinx is
used; for Philon explains an organ to be a syrinx played by the hands. The four
principles of musical pipes were evidently so well understood by the ancients,
that it would be strange indeed if they had not utilised reeds which were too large
for the mouth, and too long to be carried about in the hands. Still, we cannot
look back for the organ to any barbarous age. A love of harmony, and of hearing
several instruments in concert, must have arisen before the organ would have
been brought into ordinary use.
The word organ retained its wide application to
musical instruments of all classes, down to the times of the fathers of the
Christian Church. For instance, St. Augustine says that all musical instruments
are called organs, not merely
the organ which is of large dimensions, and which is blown by bellows, but also
every kind of instrument upon which a tune can be played, or which may be used
for accompanying the voice.
The Emperor Julian wrote an epigram upon the Pneumatic
Organ, in which he alludes to its metal pipes and to its leathern bellows. As
the epigram is written in the form of an enigma, it is less easy to translate.
Dr. Burney, Dr. Busby, and others, accomplished it by passing over some of
the words, I therefore attempt a more literal version.
I see reeds, or pipes, of a different kind : I ween
that from another, a metallic
soil, they have perchance rather sprung up. These are agitated wildly, and not
by our breath; but a blast, rushing from within the hollow of a bull’s hide,
passes underneath, below the foundation of the well-pierced pipes, and a
skilled artist, possessed of nimble fingers, regulates by his wandering touch
the connecting rods of the pipes, and these rods, softly springing to his
touch, express [squeeze out] the song.
There are several words in the above which will bear
two constructions, and thus may form an enigma. For instance, donax is not only a reed shaken by the wind,
and a reed pipe, but also a metal organ pipe. Theodoret uses calamus in the last sense, in a
comparison included in the third of his Ten Orations on Providence,
where he says : It is like a musical organ which consists of copper or
bronze pipes, inflated by leather bellows, and which, when played upon by the
fingers of a skilled musician, produces that enharmonic reverberation of sound.
Cassiodorus, who was Consul of Rome in 514, retired in
the latter part of his life to a monastery of his own founding. He there wrote,
among other works, certain Commentaries on the Psalms, which
he acknowledged to be, in a great measure, derived from the comments of St.
Augustine. In his exposition of the 150th Psalm, Cassiodorus thus describes the
organ of his day:The or gan,
therefore, is like a tower, made of different pipes, from which, by the blowing
of bellows, a most copious sound is secured; and, in order that a suitable
modulation may regulate the sounds, it is constructed with certain tongues of
wood from the interior, which the fingers of the masters, duly pressing (or
forcing back), elicit a full-sounding and most sweet song.
In this last quotation, there is some doubt whether he
may not mean an organ with sliders only; for the word reprimentes would
apply equally to pressing down a key and to forcing back a slider which last is the effect produced by pressing a key. We have in this case a
Roman, instead of a Greek, writer before us; and one whose date falls within
what were once termed the Dark Ages. They were indeed dark as to music. The
organ was then falling into disuse in Rome; and, consequently, the art of its
construction was soon afterwards lost.
It is from passages of this indefinite class, and from
descriptions of rudely constructed instruments of later date, that the
employment of keys in ancient organs has been doubted. Cassiodorus speaks of
organists in the plural number; two would, indeed, be required if the organ had
but sliders. On the other hand, he refers to playing it with the fingers, and
not with the entire hand, therefore it is still to be assumed that the organ
was provided with keys. If the instrument had sliders, and no keys to command
them, either the entire hand or the forefinger and thumb would be used, and not
merely the fingers.
The last notable point in the quotation from
Cassiodorus is, that the sounds produced by the organists are not termed
harmony (concentum), but simply an air (cantilenam). This may be because he sums up the
whole effect as one; but, if to be taken literally, how greatly must the art of
organ-playing have declined in the early part of the sixth century, supposing
two persons to have been required to play the treble and base of an air! The
doubts of our earlier historians as to Greek and Roman organs having been
furnished with keys are to be accounted for by their not having known the Pneumatika of Heron. Neither Dr. Burney nor Sir John
Hawkins refers to Heron’s work in their Histories, nor would they expect to
find a description of the Hydraulic Organ in a work professedly on Pneumatics.
Each, therefore, required better data to enable him to form a sound judgment.
GREEK WORDS MISAPPLIED
Having now brought down an account of the organ from
its earliest known date to the sixth century, its future history will pass
through the ordeal of a second infancy of music, in the Middle Ages,
before that noble instrument can emerge in its full powers. The obscurity which
reigned in those ages was originally and mainly due to the indifference which
had so long characterized the Romans as to arts and sciences which would
neither tend to their pecuniary advantage, nor assist them to an advance in the
State. Neither in the times of Roman virtue, nor in those after times of luxury
and self-indulgence, do we find symptoms of that earnest desire for knowledge
which was characteristic of the ancient Greeks. It would be vain to search for
a Socrates, a Plato, an Aristotle, a Didymus, or even a Claudius Ptolemy, among
Romans. Bunsen has said, rather severely, that the divine thirst for knowledge
for its own sake, or for truth from a love of truth, never disturbed a Roman
mind.
After they had conquered the Greeks, the Romans
embellished their own language by so large an importation of Greek words, as to
form no inconsiderable part of a modern Latin dictionary; but partly from
inattention, and partly from insufficient knowledge of the Greek tongue, they
so misapplied many of the words, as to cause the greatest perplexity to such
after-enquirers as have sought to learn Greek arts through the medium of Latin
interpretations.
This was especially the case in music, but the
misapplication of Greek terms extended far beyond that greatest of arts. Even
in architecture, upon which the Romans especially prided themselves,
indifference as to the preservation of right meanings of words was equally
manifest. Vitruvius comments upon some of these misapplied terms in his book ; but, like a true Roman, not from any desire
to see them restored to their proper places, but simply to explain the words
for the benefit of philologists.
Unhappily, there was no Vitruvius to explain to us the
misappropriation of Greek terms in music, and, consequently, they have
remained, to this time, the great stumbling-block to an intelligent
appreciation of the Greek system.
Further than this, Western Europe was taught through
the Latin medium that there are but three accents (prosodiai)
in the Greek language. Discussions have consequently been carried on for more
than a century, and many of the ablest scholars in Europe have taken part in
them, to decide whether Greek accents have that quantity in them which
characterizes the accents of modern Europe, or whether they have not. Each
side, indeed, might claim to have been right, according to its different
acceptation of the word accents or prosodiai;
for, while the acute and the grave accents have neither stress nor
quantity assigned to them by any ancient Greek author, there are other prosodiai which have quantity. Again, there is one
for hard breathing, therefore it involves the stress which has been claimed for
them.
Ancient authorities define accents as of three kinds;
the first, for the pitch of the sound; the second, for its duration; and the
third, for the hard or soft breathing of vowels and consonants. The three which
are for pitch are the acute, the grave, and the circumflex accents; the two for
time are identical with those which are still used in prosody to mark long and
short syllables; and the two for the management of the breath are the
well-known signs which are placed over Greek vowels, to denote hard or soft
breathings. Some writers, indeed, add three more to the above seven, viz., the
apostrophe, the hyphen, and the short stop called hypodiastole,
but no marks, which were on the same level or under the words, are generally
admitted among prosodiai.
Prosodiai were signs to guide the voice in recitation of all kinds, and out of
those accents grew the systems of ecclesiastical notation, called pneumata guides for the management of the breath, now called neumes. These are
abundantly exhibited in manuscripts of the Eastern, and of the early Western,
Churches; but the two divisions worked out their systems differently. Neumes
did not originally designate any definite notes or pitch, because musical
intervals were not required in recitation. If any fixed musical sounds had been
designed, letters over the words would necessarily have been employed, as in
Greek music, instead of such indefinite marks.
In the course of after-ages, some of the scribes
attached to the Western Church drew faint lines through each row of the neumes
with a plummet, while others painted coloured lines
through them, first one, and afterwards two lines red and saffron. These were to guide as to the starting notes of the
chants, and as to the degrees of ascent or descent for the voice. Thus the
present musical notation by lines and spaces had its origin. Square and round
notes, to mark time, are of later date.
THE ORIGIN OF ACCENTS.
The word accentus, from which we
derive accent, is compounded of ad and cantus,
which is a translation of the Greek pros ode. Length of syllable is
therefore quite as much a part of accent, or prosodia,
as the elevation or depression of the voice. The Latin word cantus, like the
Greek ode, includes all recitation of verse, and all irregular chanting, as
well as that which is governed by strictly musical intervals.
It is commonly reputed that Aristophanes of Byzantium invented
the marks for Greek accents. This rests upon the supposed authority of Arcadius
of Antioch, who is said to have lived at some uncertain date after the
completion of the second century of our era. But as Aristophanes flourished in
the third century before Christ, the uncorroborated evidence of Arcadius is
insufficient to establish an event 500 years before his own time. Moreover, his
account is irreconcilable with passages referring to accents in the works of
ancient authors, such as the one I have already quoted from Aristoxenus. Aristoxenus flourished a century before Aristophanes
of Byzantium. Again, recitation of the Homeric poems had been an especial
subject for competition in the public games of Greece from the far earlier date
of Terpander; and the copies of these poems are said to have been irregular in metre until they received the polish of the Alexandrian
grammarians. Aristophanes was one of the most eminent of those grammarians.
Irregularities in the Homeric poems were excused, because they had been written
for chanting. The very irregularities made those simplest of marks (which
required no genius to invent) almost indispensable for the study of the
rhapsodists. It is then by far more probable that Aristophanes marked the
accents afresh, after he had polished the poems, and had thus made certain
changes necessary, than that he was the first inventor of those essential
guides to rhapsodists. It should not be forgotten that poems thus chanted, are
the most ancient of all Greek literature.
The passage in which the first employment of
Greek prosodiai or accents of
the three kinds is attributed to Aristophanes of Byzantium is more probably the
production of some later commentator than Arcadius of Antioch. Judging by the
Leipzig edition of 1820, it is not included in the acknowledged work of
Arcadius upon the subject of accents; and the sole authority for attributing it
to him seems to be a very indifferent manuscript in the Imperial, or National,
Library in Paris. Another codex in the same collection includes this panegyric
upon Aristophanes in the Grammar of Theodosius of Alexandria (who was himself
one of the commentators upon Dionysius of Thrace); while the best of all the
manuscripts, the one of highest authority, which is in the Library at
Copenhagen, omits it altogether.
It is, however, quite unimportant, even if written by
one or other of these late grammarians; for, when opposed to conflicting
evidence of much earlier date, and examined by the light of reason, the
originality of Aristophanes becomes incredible. While so much thought was
given to the art of writing down music in the age of Aristoxenus,
that he complained of the too great attention paid to it, as being mere
mechanism instead of art, is it probable that the declamation of the Homeric
poems and others, the staple music for the lyres of few strings, can have been
altogether without its kindred notation? To what other can Aristoxenus refer when he writes of the prosodiai which
accompany diction?
GREEK RHAPSODISTS.
Upon this point it may be broadly stated that all the
reciters of epic poetry, and all those who used lyres of four, five, and six
strings, were mere rhapsodists, or chanters; and that Greek music, in our sense
of the word, began with the Anacreons, Sapphos, and others, who sang lyric poetry, and employed
the many-stringed Asiatic lyres to accompany the voice.
The limit to the fluctuations of the voice in
discourse was fixed by Dionysius of Halicarnassus, as within the musical
interval of a Fifth. Any discussion, which would fluctuate even so widely,
would appear energetic to men of ounmorthern extraction. It was probably not greater than a Fifth in those ancient
recitations, although they were carried on at a higher pitch than the
conversational tone of voice, for the sake of superior audibility.
Having commented upon the indifference shown by the
Romans as to whether they did or did not misapply Greek words, it should be
added that, among the moderns, there have been instances of a like indifference
as to the texts of Roman authors, at least, upon the rhythmical arts. Not a
little carelessness has been exhibited occasionally where it would be least
expected. A writer so pre-eminent as Cicero had strong claims to careful
treatment from his editors; but even his works have not yet obtained their full meed of attention. Suppose, for example, we take
Cicero’s Treatises
on Oratory, which form the second volume of his works, as
re-edited by an eminent scholar, one whose edition has been recently
stereotyped. Cicero is still misrepresented as having said that the rhythmical
foot is divided into three parts. Anything so manifestly incorrect must grate
upon the ear of every thinking reader. How could the two equal syllables of a
spondee be divided into three parts? If any one of the numerous antecedent
editors would but have put that question to himself, he would surely have been
led to consider the context, in order to arrive at the author’s meaning. Then
he would have found unequivocal proof that Cicero did not assert that a foot in
rhythm is divisible into three parts, but that it may be divided in three ways.
In the ensuing
lines of the text the three ways are exemplified.
(1), Either the
one part of the foot must be equal to the other; or,
(2), It must be
double the length of the other;
or else,
(3), The one
must be in the proportion of three to two of the other.
The editors were possibly confused by a second error
in the incorrect old text, although this second is quite as palpable as the
first. The word plus has been omitted, and thus the first and second
ways are represented as identical. For the first mode of division is, one part
equal to the other and the second is said in the text to be, one part as much
as the other instead of as much
more than the other.
In doubtful cases it would have been necessary to
refer to manuscripts, but corrections such as these are self-evident. Cicero
continues the illustration by examples which are familiar to all.
For the first mode, or the equal division of parts, he
cites the dactyl, of which the first syllable is long, and the second and
third, being both short, are equal to one long. His second example is the
iambus, of which the first syllable is short, and the second long; therefore
the second is double the length of the first. His third example is the paeon,
and this is of two principal kinds. The first kind commences with a long
syllable, followed by three short ones, as desinite, incipite, and comprimite and
the second kind commences with the three short, andends with the one long syllable, as domuerant, and sonipides.
One long is equal to two breves, in syllables as well
as in music, so that either kind of paeon is sesquialteral,
or in the proportion of 3 to 2 in its parts. The paeon, says Cicero, is
unsuitable for poetry, and is therefore the better adapted for oratory, since
oratory ought not to sound like verse. Nevertheless, there should be a
perceptible rhythm in all oratory, as in good prose-writing. In these cases the
rhythm is constituted by a judicious intermixture of short with long syllables,
and of short with long words, so that each sentence may seem to flow from the
tongue. Its divisions are then marked by the rise and fall of the voice, by
emphasis, and by pause or punctuation.
THE MEANING OF THE LATIN SESQUI.
Now, as to the word sesqui, which occurs
in the quotation from Cicero. It is of constant employment in music, and some
have supposed it to be an abbreviation of semisque,
because a sesquilibra equals
in quantity a pound and a half, and a sesquicyathus a
cup and a half. But this coincidence occurs only in certain cases, for the
translation half will not hold good when sesqui is prefixed to any number
greater than 2. Its quantity diminishes as the number rises, for it is but the
unit above its accompanying number. Our musical consonances are generally in
the ratio of the unit above; and sesqui is used to designate
them according to their proportions. Thus the sesquialter proportion is of 3 to 2, and it represents the musical interval of a Fifth; sesquitertius is the proportion of 4 to 3, and is therefore
equal to the musical interval of a Fourth ; while the sesquioctava is the proportion which 9 bears to 8, and so represents the musical interval of
a major tone.
The Octave, being 2 to 1, is not a sesqui, but a
duplex. Therefore the principal sesqui, the one of largest proportions, and of
lowest numbers, is 3 to 2, or the unit above 2. Perhaps, for this
reason, 3 to 2 may have been adopted as the meaning of the word when
coupled with quantity, instead of with number; and in this way only can the
proportions of the sesquilibra and the sesquicyathus be consistently accounted for. The Greeks had
two different words to distinguish the proportions. If so large as 3 to 2, it
was hemiolios, and epi was
employed for all numbers higher than 2, and then signified the unit above the
number specified. By dividing the one pound into two parts, and adding another
such part, the quantity becomes a pound and a half.
Some Orientalist may yet inform us from what language
sesqui is derived; but, in the meantime, it may be observed that, in music, it
is equivalent to the Greek epi if the number to which it is prefixed be higher
than 2, and to the Latin super. For instance, the Greek word epitritos can only be translated into Latin
by sesquitertius, or supertertius, and in English it must be rendered, the
proportion of 4 to 3, or
the interval of a Fourth.
In the opening chapter of this volume it
was stated that Cicero frequently paraphrased Aristotle, and that
Quintilian did the like by Cicero. It is well then to observe that the passage
just quoted from Cicero is one of those, which owe their parentage to
Aristotle, and is likewise one which was borrowed from Cicero by Quintilian.
The original will be found in Aristotle’s Treatise on Rhetoric, and the third
in order is in Quintilian’s work on Oratory. The two are subjoined in
foot-notes, to facilitate comparison.
The extract from Quintilian affords, unluckily, two
other cases of editorial remissness; but the original fault is probably
chargeable upon the transcriber’s incompetence to decipher old manuscripts. The
words sescuplex and sescuplum are evidently copyist’s blunders; the
first should be sesquiplex (equivalent
to sesquiplus), and the second should be sesquiplicem. Judging from other errors in the text
of Quintilian, we may form our opinion as to how these two have occurred. The
letter q is often used in manuscripts as an abbreviation for qui, and the
copyist probably mistook the writing of a shorttailed q for cu. Then plicem would also be
abbreviated, after the letter l, and the copyist, understanding neither
abbreviations nor the subject of the book, converted plicem into plum.
This seems to be the only reasonable explanation of his having changed the
proportion of three to two into sixfold. The texts of the three authors
establish one another.
A few words may be added as to the English
pronunciation of Latin in singing. More than two hundred years ago Milton
wrote, in his Tractate on Education, that to smatter Latin with an
English mouth is as ill hearing as Law French. We have therefore had ample time
to think about it, and we are beginning to act. The excuse for not having done
so before is this :
The pronunciation of Latin in the English fashion was
not only allowed, but encouraged, after the Reformation; for by that test a
scholar bred up in England could be distinguished from one educated at a
foreign university. It thus became a trap to catch a Jesuit. But since
toleration has been extended to all religious creeds by the good sense of the
English Government, the motive for mispronouncing Latin has passed away.
No manner of speaking the language could be more
devoid of authority than the English. In our native tongue we have twisted the
vowels round upon the wheel until we have made the soft a to
take the place of e, our e to take the place
of i, and i and y to
have commonly the same sound. To this there are, of course, exceptions, as
there are to all rules of pronunciation in the English language; but such
has been the general system of speaking Latin by Englishmen. It has neither the
warranty of our own more ancient language, of Northern English, of Scotch, of
Irish, nor of any European tongue, except our own.
Before quitting the field of ancient history to turn
to that of the middle ages, there is one instrument much referred to, and
described by early Latin commentators on the Psalms, and although its name is
of Greek derivation, it does not correspond with the Greek instrument.
A Greek psaltery has already been exhibited, where it
is in the hands of Erato; and both the name of the muse and of the instrument
are inscribed on the pedestal of the statue.
It is there of quadrilateral form, whereas the
psalteries described by Cassiodorus and by others are triangular, and must
therefore be more nearly represented by the Greek and Etruscan Trigons, or by
the Assyrian Harp. The last especially had the sounding body above instead of
below the strings. The accompanying figure is copied from one of the
Sculptured marble slabs winch were taken from the palace of Konyunjik, Nineveh, and are now in the British Museum. It
represents an Assyrian musician attending upon the King Asshur-Bani-Pal in his
garden. The reign of this king is known to have been from B.C. 667 to 647. The
form of the harp and its sound-holes is better developed in this sculpture than
in others which represent the triumph of the same king over the Susians, and which are also in the British Museum. Here,
too, the bow shape of the back of the instrument is well defined.
Cassiodorus describes the psaltery as having its
sounding body above the strings, as in this example, and he contrasts it with
the harp, which has its hollow wood for emitting sound situated below the
strings.
Within a century after the death of Cassiodorus,
Isidore of Seville, the young friend of Pope Gregory the Great, describes the
Psaltery as in the form of the Greek letter Delta. Isidore was made a Bishop in
601, and died in 636. The Assyrian harp would make but an indifferent Delta, on
account of its rounded back, and its want of a third
side to complete the triangle. So Isidore can only allude to another form of
psaltery, of which examples will be shown in the sequel. When we descend still
lower in the scale of time, we shall meet with descriptions of this instrument
as one which in shape resembles a four-cornered shield. Thus it resumes the
form of the Greek model. The psalteries of the middle ages were therefore of
different kinds, and agreed only in being of the harp class. They had no finger
boards to press the strings against, and so to make one string produce many
notes, but they were played with the fingers, like the harp, and derived their
general name from being used to accompany the voice in psalmody.
Another beautiful sculpture in the British Museum
deserves reproduction here, as an example of an ancient flute, with an unusual
mouthpiece. At one time the flute was taught to all high-born Greeks, but
Alcibiades drove it out of fashion, because he thought it disfigured the
beauty of his mouth. That objection once raised was found too serious an
obstacle to the continuance of its use by any other young Athenian of
fashion. In the example before us, the instrument itself is removed from immediate
contact with the lips, by the mouthpiece, and thus the entire face of the flute
player is rendered visible. The position of the hands is admirably suggestive
of the act of playing.
The original is a marble terminal statue from the Civitst Lavinia, the ancient Lanuvium.
It has been guessed to be a representation of Comus.
Roman orators had sometimes a flute player or piper
behind them to give them the pitch for their orations. At least, one such
instance is mentioned by Cicero, by Plutarch, and by Quintilian. It is of the
celebrated orator, Caius Gracchus, whose splendid and persuasive eloquence for
a long time carried all before him in Rome. He had a servant, named Licinius,
who stood at his back when Caius spoke in public; and this Licinius being, as
Plutarch says, a sensible man, judged when the drator was straining his voice to too high a pitch, and would then sound a lower note,
in order to bring it down; and when, on the contrary, Caius had adopted too low
a tone, Licinius would sound a higher note, in order to indicate that he should
raise his voice to that pitch. The pitchpipe, according to Cicero, was of
ivory; and, as Quintilian gives it the Greek name of tonarion,
we may suppose instruments of the same kind to have been used by Greeks.
It cannot be doubted that orators used a certain
amount of chanting or intonation in their addresses; and hence they are
commonly represented in sculpture and in paintings with musical instruments
beside them usually a lyre resting on the left arm. It would, indeed, be difficult now
to ascertain the extent to which this kind of sing-song was carried; but it is
evident from the books on oratory, including the admirable work of Dionysius of
Halicarnassus, De Compositione Verborum, that the tones of the voice formed a complete study, both for recitations
and for harangues, as well as for what is more strictly music, in our sense of
the word.
Melodia, in
Greek, and cantus, in Latin, apply equally to inflexions of the
voice in prose and in verse; indeed, cantus is sometimes
employed when neither musical intervals nor agreeable sounds were intended, as
in the cantus galli, or crowing of the cock; unless, indeed,
we are to suppose the ancient cock to have had a more melodious voice than his
descendants.
The Cantus, or Chanting of the Christian
Church, and its variations in different ages, as well as the differences of
practice between the Eastern and Western branches of the Church, are subjects
for a future volume; but before that division took place, and before the
so-called antiphonal singing had been introduced, the chanting in the churches
of Alexandria seems to have been identical with Greek rhapsodizing.
Materials for the history of those times are by no
means abundant, but this inference may be drawn from an incidental notice in
St. Augustines ‘Confessions. It is, however, necessary to
preface the passage by his account of his own preferences, in order to show the
force of the context.
St. Augustine expresses his delight in hearing the
Psalms chanted according to musical modes, or scales, having the accompaniment of a musical instrument, to regulate and
to guide the voice. His experience had told him that Psalms thus sung had a far
greater effect upon his own mind than by any other means, although he felt at
the time unable to explain the hidden cause.
The cause, although hidden at the time from St.
Augustine, may be traced with very little difficulty. It was simply that he had
taken advantage of opportunities to cultivate his ears. That cultivation was
afterwards evinced by his writing a treatise upon music and upon rhythm, in six
books, which are still extant. He had therefore learnt how much more forcibly
the sacred words are expressed with the aid of music than by any mere reading
or recitation.
Augustine tells us that sometimes he hesitated
whether, after all, he might not have been deriving something of earthly
pleasure from his sacred music; and, in one of those moods, he contrasted with
his own practice that of St. Athanasius, when Bishop of Alexandria, of whose
precepts he had often heard.
St. Athanasius directed the readers of the Psalms in
churches to use such moderate inflexions of the voice, that it approached more
nearly to speaking than to singing.
If, then, the Psalms were not sung according to
musical modes or scales in Alexandria during the pontificate of Athanasius,
there remained no other way than by those indefinite sounds which the Greeks
termed natural music or unrestricted rhapsodizing, and which an Eastern now
employs while reading the Koran.
Having recently been indulged with a hearing of this
last kind, I can but say that it reminded me forcibly of the saying of C.
Caesar the Roman orator, about 80 years B.C., If you are singing, you sing
badly; and if you are reading, you sing. This kind of chanting appeared to me
like a series of attempts at musical intervals, every one of which was sung out
of tune.
Before closing this branch of the subject, some reader
may wish to know why, after having brought down the history to the age of St.
Augustine, no notice has been taken of what is termed Ambrosian music. The
answer is, that Ambrosian music is not of so early a time. The two systems,
Ambrosian and Gregorian, did not exist at the dates of their now-supposed
founders. The meaning of Ambrosian music is music according to the use of Milan
and of Gregorian music, according to the use of Rome. Nos Gregoriani, we who follow the use of Rome and Nos Ambrosiani, we who follow the use of Milan. Ambrose and
Gregory having been the founders of the two churches.
And now, laus Deo, I
bid farewell to ancient Egyptians, Chaldeans, Greeks, and Romans; ending with
an Egyptian caricature of a quartet concert at the Court of Rameses III. The
King himself is the royal lion playing upon the lyre; one of his courtiers is
satirized as a crocodile playing upon a lute; a second as a long-tailed animal
playing upon double pipes; while the third is represented as an ass, or a mule,
with exceedingly long ears, playing a base upon the harp, to the treble of the
King’s lyre. The characters thus satirized cannot now be judged, through our
not knowing the men; but the lion is clearly intended for Rameses III. In
another satirical drawing in the papyrus, from which the above is derived,
Rameses, as the lion, is playing a game like chess or draughts with a gazelle
in the hareem.
A short volume, like this, does not show the amount of
investigation its manifold subjects have required sometimes in art, sometimes in science, and sometimes in language. Music is
indeed a wide theme to write upon, owing to the universality of its language.
The minds and feelings of all nations have been more or less influenced by it
in all ages, according to the degrees in which they have cultivated it. A
divine origin has been attributed to music, on account of its originality, its
universally beneficial tendency, and its innocence, even when cultivated to
excess. No other art or science has so cheered the spirits of man and so
relieved a wearied mind as music. As to beneficial operation it leaves all
other arts at a distance. Justly did a Greek author say: Music is a great and
lasting pleasure to all who have learnt it and know anything about it.
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