Part 3

=Place of Music in Egyptian Life=.—To show the place of music in Egyptian life, the following from Ambros’ history will serve admirably: “From these decorations [on the walls of tombs] we perceive that the Egyptians made great use of music. We find harps of many sizes and shapes, small and easily portable, to others beyond the height of a man, crude and of the utmost simplicity, to others elaborate and extremely rich in decoration. We note an almost endless variety of =lyres=, =guitars= and =mandolins= [that is, similar in type to the instruments we know by these names], single and double flutes, played by hands of numerous musicians, together with male and female singers. Music was used to accompany the dance, the funeral cortège,[3] the banquet and other social functions. Inscriptions show that there were musicians of high social position at the court.”

=Egyptian Instruments=.—The records show a development of music from a crude simplicity in early days to a brilliant and complex system alongside of the changes in other arts and the sciences, some of the discoveries going as far back as 1625 B. C. We give illustrations of several forms of the Egyptian =harps=. The number of strings varied from three or four to twenty-one. Mr. J. F. Rowbotham, the English historian of music, says that “taking B below the bass staff as the lowest note of the Egyptian scale, (since it likely followed the Assyrian in this respect) the compass of the great harp would extend to E, first line, treble staff. The small harps of various sizes had a compass from D, third line, bass staff, to D or E above the treble staff. Another series of stringed instruments, known under the general name, lyres, had the same compass as the small harps; the lutes had a low G, (bass) string, and the highest note was C or D on the treble staff; various forms of the flutes had about the same compass; pipes, [which may be represented by the flageolet of today] had a compass of about one octave upward from E, fourth space, treble clef. Other instruments were of the percussion character, =tambourines=, =drums=, =cymbals=, etc. Although the Egyptians used their instruments in combination, there is reason to believe their practice was the alternation of groups, only occasionally using all simultaneously, to secure fulness and power of tone.”

=Philosophy and Practice of Egyptian Music=.—The consensus of opinion is that Egyptian music was melodic in character, the instruments or voices playing or singing in different octaves, rejecting other intervals. As the Greeks seem to have drawn from the Egyptians much of their practice in music, it is reasonable to suppose that they would have used harmony if the Egyptians had been accustomed to make use of it. As to the Egyptian theory of music we have no information. Since, however, Pythagoras, the Greek philosopher, was a student of the Egyptian school for priests, we infer that his teachings were founded on the science he acquired there; hence it is probable that the Egyptians were familiar with a seven-fold division of the octave and the mathematical relations of the fourth and fifth, as well as other intervals of the scale. Of the old Egyptian hymns we have no remains unless it be, as some assert, that fragments still exist among the Coptic Christians.

=The Hebrews=.—What a wonderful history is that of the Hebrews! It has seen nation after nation rise to power and go down. It has been enslaved, seemingly beyond all possibility of recovering a national existence, yet regained place. Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Rome, held the Hebrews, yet the latter are still with us, as a distinct race, while their conquerors have but pages of history. A glance at the history of the race will show that they touched the sources of early civilization. Abraham was a resident, according to the Bible story, of Ur in the land of the Chaldees, where a considerable civilization had been attained. From here he went to Canaan, thence to Egypt, and back again to the country east of the Red Sea. When his descendants went to Egypt they must have carried with them Syrian music and instruments, doubtless preserving a trace of Chaldean influence. It was during the four centuries’ sojourn in Egypt that the Hebrews, though for a time enslaved, gained the proportions of a nation. As their duties placed them in close relations to their masters, they gained considerable of the Egyptian science, literature, customs, etc. At that time, musicians were slaves, and tradition says that Miriam, the sister of Moses, was a slave dancing-girl and singer. We know that Moses was instructed in the learning of the Egyptian priesthood, and in that capacity officiated in some of the functions of the temple services. Such facts as these go far to justify the idea that the Hebrews gained their fundamental notions of music and musical instruments during their long sojourn in Egypt. Some writers claim that the songs of the Hebrews were adapted to Egyptian chants. The pastoral life led by the descendants of Abraham, the period of slavery which the Hebrews suffered in Egypt, and the subsequent migratory life in the wilderness were not adapted to develop a people’s song. The life in Palestine for many years was a strenuous one; and then came another period of slavery among the Assyrians, by which the Hebrew ideas were again modified.

=A Religious People=.—The Hebrews were an intensely religious people, the code delivered to them by Moses fixing the status of music up to the time of the pleasure-loving Solomon. Their music, in distinction from that of the nations around them, was not sensuous but a true _musica sacra_, in this respect more a matter of religion than of art. During the reign of David, the Levites were organized as the singers for the Temple services. Music and poetry were the chief subjects of instruction. David himself composed many of the tunes to which his Psalms were sung.

=Hebrew Poetry and Its Relation to Their Music=.—The key to the music of the Hebrews is their poetry. They grew to numbers under the most adverse circumstances, and developed a temperament indifferent to environment and elevated to high spiritual aspiration, making them an intensely religious people, whose life was little softened by artistic practice. The effect of the injunction against the making of “graven images,” as given them in the code of Moses, was to cut them off from the exercise of the esthetic faculty in sculpture or painting; their unsettled mode of life prevented outlet in architecture. So they poured out the whole strength of their passionate, powerful natures in poetry and song. The most striking characteristic of the Hebrew poetry is the parallelism of the phrases, each sentence or complete thought being made up of two similar or contrasted thoughts, and the accompanying music must have had the same character. The following from the Psalms shows this feature:

“Lord, hear my voice: let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplication.” “I will not give sleep to my eyes, or slumber to mine eyelids.”

When the great choirs of men singers were organized for the Temple services, this parallelism brought about the division into two bodies, who sang alternately, a practice in use today in certain churches with ritualistic services, and known as antiphonal singing.

=Hebrew Music=.—It is unfortunate that we have no reason to believe that the hymns in use in the Jewish synagogues today are sung to the tunes of thousands of years ago, even if modified. In the various countries of Europe, Spain, Italy, Germany, Russia, the airs are quite different, suggesting that tradition has failed to deliver anything that can traced to the days of the poet-king of Israel. Some authorities find in the Gregorian chants traces of Hebrew melodies which came down from the early Christians of Jewish birth and training. Clement of Alexandria says that their songs were earnest and dignified; there must have been some special character in them as shown by the command of the Babylonians, “Sing us the songs of Zion.” The principal relation that the Hebrews have to the history of music arises from the enduring impress the works of the Psalmist and other portions of the Scriptures have made upon the music of the Christian Church.

=Hebrew Instruments=.—The Hebrews borrowed their instruments from other nations, principally from the Egyptians, the one most favored being a form of the =harp=, small enough to be portable, used to give effect to the chanting of the prophets. “To prophesy meant to sing,” and it is quite likely that Isaiah, Jeremiah and the other inspired poets uttered their thoughts in verse and song, both being extemporized.

The student should bear in mind that the various musical instruments mentioned in the Bible must be understood as types. The harp of David was not the same as our harp, the organ was not like our great church instruments, viols, sackbuts, cornets, pipes, psalteries, etc., are names given by the translators to the Hebrew terms used in the Bible. They used words with which they were familiar, and which they thought corresponded in type to the instruments used by the Hebrews.

REFERENCES.

Rowbotham.—History of Music.

Naumann.—History of Music, Vol. I.

Engel.—Musical Instruments.

Smith.—The World’s Earliest Music.

Anderson.—The Story of Extinct Civilizations.

Maspéro.—Ancient Egypt and Assyria.

Dickinson.—Music in the History of the Western Church.

QUESTIONS.

What great river valley was the home of the Chaldeans?

What do we know of music among the Akkads?

What evidence have we to show that the Assyrians held music in high esteem?

What instruments did they use?

How do we learn of the ideas of the Egyptians in regard to music?

Who controlled the knowledge of music and other sciences and arts? Was this beneficial to music?

What instruments did the Egyptians use?

What was the character of Egyptian music?

What was the origin of the Hebrew race?

What influences did they come under in Egypt?

What difference was there between the music of the Hebrews and that of the nations around them?

Why did they express themselves in poetry and music?

What was a leading characteristic of their poetry?

Have any ancient Hebrew melodies been preserved?

What musical instruments did the Hebrews have? What was the origin of these instruments?

LESSON III.

MUSIC OF THE GREEKS: SCALES.

When we think of Greece, it is Athens, the centre of Greek art and culture, that comes to mind. An ancient city, Athens, as history teaches us. The record is that it was founded by Cecrops, who brought a colony from Egypt, in 1556 B. C., a period when Egypt was a centre of power, wealth, education and science. Therefore we infer that these colonists brought with them to Greece the ordinary, popular music and instruments to which they had become accustomed in their home. But there was an older Greece; for late discoveries show that there were five cities, each built upon the ruins of an older city, the first one going back to 2500 B. C. These earlier inhabitants, themselves an offshoot of the great Aryan race, were absorbed by the colonists.

=Music and Myth in Greece=.—The beginnings of music in Greece are mingled with myths: Pan, Apollo, Mercury, Athene and others appear as the patrons and exemplars of the musical art. Aside from the names of the mythical gods and goddesses, there are names of human beings that stand out with clearness. These early musicians were singers or bards who chanted the songs composed in honor of chiefs and tribal heroes. Such were Hyagnis, 1506 B. C., Marsyas, his son, and Olympus the elder, Orpheus, Musæus (1426 B. C.), chief of the Eleusinian mysteries, Linus, Amphion, Thaletes, whose songs were favorites of Pythagoras; the greatest of these bards was the blind Homer, to whom the date 900 B. C. is assigned. “By the Greeks, music as an art was considered an aid in regulating by rule the inflections of the voice, to mark the places of emphasis, and to define the pauses in the recitation of their epic poetry; and the rhythm of their songs followed strictly laws that had been laid down; innovation was reprehended, and even prohibited.”[4]

=Early Greek Musicians and Writers=.—The earliest musician’s name met with in the annals of music is that of =Terpander= (676 B. C), who is said to have increased the number of strings on the lyre from four to seven. Next in order was =Pythagoras= (585-505 B. C.), who added an eighth string to the lyre. He was called the discoverer of the Tetrachord, which is still known by this name, the inventor or discoverer of the Octave Scale, also the discoverer of the ratios of the consonances; but there is no doubt that he learned all these things during his sojourn in Egypt. He is also credited with the invention of the Canon or Monochord with movable bridges, a contrivance still in use for investigating the ratios of intervals. Unfortunately none of the writings—if any ever existed—of Pythagoras have come down to us. Our knowledge of his theories is second-hand, gathered from the writings of his disciples. Pythagoras seems to have studied sound more in the manner of the acoustician than of the musician; hence his followers, or rather those who called themselves by his name, were more concerned with the ratios of sounds than with their musical effects.

Among the great philosophers who treated on music, =Aristotle= (384 B. C.) holds an important place. We find his theories expressed in one of his works called “Problems.” A pupil of his—=Aristoxenus= (350-320 B. C.), has left the most valuable treatise on music, of any of the ancients, the oldest musical work known at the present time; it is, unfortunately, not complete. Aristoxenus was a practical, in addition to being a theoretical musician; he thought that the ear was the final court of appeal in matters musical. Hence the musical world was divided into two factions: the Pythagoreans, who held that music was purely a matter for arithmetical investigation, and the Aristoxenians, who claimed that the chief end of music was to be listened to. This dispute lasted for many centuries. =Boethius=, the Roman philosopher, in his writings takes sides with the Pythagoreans and pours contempt on the mere musician. The successors of the Pythagoreans are even yet not extinct, as every now and again some wiseacre turns up with a scheme to secure just intonation, at the price of losing all that music has gained under our present system. =Plato= (430 B. C.), the greatest of philosophers, has much to say about music; but these sayings are largely incomprehensible to modern understandings. =Euclid= (323 B. C.), the great mathematician, treated largely of music.[5] =Aristides Quintilianus= was another author of great weight. =Plutarch=, in his _Symposia_, has one devoted to music, but unfortunately the meaning of these authors is often so obscure that it cannot now be discovered. Alexandria, in Egypt, came into prominence in music when the great library was founded there by Alexander the Great, in 332 B. C. =Eratosthenes= (276-196 B. C.), the librarian, figures in the mathematics of music. When we reach the Christian Era, we meet with two more writers, =Didymus= (A. D. 60), who introduced the “minor”[6] tone into the scale, and =Claudius Ptolemy= (A. D. 130).

=The Music of Ancient Greece the Foundation of Modern European Music=.—Although the history of European music properly begins with the music of Ancient Greece, we are still very ignorant of the subject, owing to the fact that there is not in existence a note of music anterior to the Christian Era. But lately, in the ancient treasure house at Delphi, a hymn was found inscribed in marble on the inner wall. Mr. J. P. Mahaffy, an authority in matters pertaining to Greek literature, says: “The time is given by the metre, a long syllable and three short, variously placed, or two long and a short between them, in every case 5-8 in a measure.... As regards the accompaniment or harmonizing of the air, there is none extant. [As to the melody] although there is rhythm and even a recurrence of phrases to mark the close of the period, nothing worthy of being called melody in any modern sense is to be found.” The inscription dates from the third century before Christ, is a hymn to Apollo and the Muses, and consists of phrases equal to eighty measures in our modern reckoning. The blank spaces in the measure were filled in by an instrument, probably the cithara. Our knowledge is confined to the treatises of mathematicians and musicians, previously mentioned, and these works are often so obscure that there is much uncertainty as to their meaning. Besides, these writings are scattered over a period of about 800 years; that is, from 585 B. C., the date of Pythagoras, to 130 A. D., the date of Claudius Ptolemy. Numberless changes took place in the art in the course of this long period; hence the attempt to elucidate a homogeneous system by comparing these writings is about as hopeless as would be the attempt to deduce the modern system of music from the collocation of the works of Guido and Hucbald of the 10th century with those of Richter and Prout in the 19th.

We owe much to the labors of these bygone writers; in fact, the Greek system of music is the foundation upon which the modern system is the superstructure. No attempt will be made here to settle the many disputed points that have puzzled the learned for ten or more centuries, but a clear and concise account of all that is necessary to an understanding of the place of this system in the historical development of music will be given.

=Formation of the Greek Scale=.—The Greek Scale was founded on a tetrachord or succession of four sounds, arranged as follows:

E (half tone) F (whole tone) G (whole tone) A

It is commonly believed that these letters written on the bass staff, thus:

[Music]

represent the exact pitch, as near as may be, of this tetrachord. In early times the lyre was tuned to these four sounds, and was called the _Tetrachordon_; that is, four strings. This gracefully shaped instrument has remained to this day the symbol of music. This limited scale was extended by adding another tetrachord, which began with the last note of the first tetrachord, thus:

A—B♭ C D E—F G A

making a scale of seven sounds, called the scale of _Conjunct_ or _Joined Tetrachords_; also from its seven strings, the Heptachord scale. The next step was to take in the limit of the octave. The first way adopted was to raise the highest string a whole tone, thus making it the octave of the lowest; the sixth string was also raised a whole tone to make it a whole tone below the seventh. The result was a scale of seven sounds with one degree omitted, thus:

A—B♭ (C) D E E—F G A

The next form was:

E—F G A B (C) D E

It will be seen that in this scale the second tetrachord begins a whole tone above the first, instead of beginning with the final of the first. It is therefore called the scale of _Disjunct_ or _Separated Tetrachords_. The missing sound (C) is here added and the octave scale is complete. When the lyre had seven strings, the middle string, that is, the fourth, counting from either end, was called _Mese_, which means “middle”; but this word soon gained a secondary meaning which, in time, became the most important, viz.: _Keynote_.

=The Lesser Perfect System=.—There was in use at the same time a scale called the _Lesser Perfect System_, which was made from the conjunct seven-note scale by adding another conjunct tetrachord below, thus:

A—B♭ C D E—F G A (A) B—C D E

Then A was added below the first tetrachord to make an octave with the note _Mese_. This A was the lowest sound admitted in the Greek System. It was the Romans who gave to this series of sounds the first seven letters of the alphabet, which they still retain. This octave (A to A) is also the origin of our natural minor scale. This Lesser System was the scale used in the Temple rites. It continued to be used for this purpose long after the system about to be described was invented.

=The Greater Perfect System=.—This was made from the disjunct octave by adding a conjunct tetrachord below and one above, thus:

E—F G A E—F G A B—C D E (A) B—C D E

The A below was also added, thus making a scale two octaves in extent. In later times the disjunct tetrachord, B—C—D—E, was added at the top. This E was the highest note admitted in the Greek System; consequently, their music never exceeded the limits of two octaves and a fifth, and the sounds included in these systems were as follows:

[Music: Greater Perfect System without B♭

Added Note Lesser Perfect System without B♮]

Peculiar interest attaches to this series of sounds, because in the Middle Ages they were supposed to be the _only_ sounds admitted by the Greeks. This accounts for the fact that B was the first note that it was considered right to use in two forms.

=The Greek Scales=.—The Greeks did not by any means confine themselves to these sounds, but changed the pitch of the starting note just as we do with our scales; in other words, both of these systems might be transposed. Therefore they not only had all the sounds at command that we have, but as their scales were (theoretically, at least) tuned acoustically true, they had a great many more. But their scales were all diatonic (the scales they called Chromatic and Enharmonic will be explained later), they were all like our natural minor. When they said “Dorian Scale” they meant just what we mean when we say scale of D minor; Phrygian Scale meant E minor; Lydian Scale, F-sharp minor; Mixo-Lydian, G minor. In addition to these four scales there were three that began a fourth below, one a fourth below the Dorian, called the Hypo-Dorian, A minor; a fourth below the Phrygian, called the Hypo-Phrygian, B minor; and a fourth below the Lydian, called Hypo-Lydian, C-sharp minor; these were the standard scales of Greek music. These names, Dorian, etc., were retained in the Ecclesiastical System, but the mistake was made of supposing that the Greeks used only the fixed sounds given by the untransposed Greater System. Hence the Church Dorian has B natural, not B-flat; the Church Phrygian, F natural, not F sharp; and the Church Lydian begins on F natural, instead of on F sharp. Hence, no two church scales are alike in the positions of the halftones.

QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS.

Name some of the myths connected with music among the Greeks. Consult a work on mythology.

Name the musicians and philosophers connected with Greek music; arrange them in chronological order, with dates.

State the successive points of development.

Why do we consider that the history of music as we know it today begins with Greek music?

Have we music that belongs to the Greek period?

On what was the Greek Scale founded?

How was this extended? What name did this form receive?

In what respect did the Disjunct form differ from the Conjunct?

What was the _Mese_?

What was the Lesser Perfect System?

What was the Greater Perfect System?

What was the highest note used by the Greeks? What was the lowest?

Were these systems transposable?

What is the meaning of the prefix “Hypo”?

LESSON IV.

MUSIC OF THE GREEKS (_Concluded_).

=The Greek Octave System=.—So far, everything is clear enough; but the next step is not quite so sure. The Greeks spoke of the Dorian Octave, the Phrygian Octave, and so on; and the word Octave, used in this way, has been thought to be synonymous with Scale, which is doubtful, for the following reasons:

The standard instrument of the Greeks was the octave lyre. The lowest and highest strings were tuned respectively A, fifth line bass staff, and A, second space, treble.