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Ancient Cymbals, &c From Herculaneum.

The tambourine (which is rarely seen among us) is made by stretching a prepared skin over a hoop or frame and they differ only in the size of the circle, their depth and their appendage of bells and ornaments. All of the accompanying specimens are now used among the Orientals, and are often used by the muezzins at sunset, in calling the people to prayers.

The first figure represents a small tambourine, consisting simply of the hoop and skin, of an oval shape, to which weights are attached. These weights, when the instrument is whirled round in the hand, strike the sonorous skin, and produce the desired sounds. The second figure has the rappers or weights, with the addition of bells, and was probably played with the hand by pulsation. The sides of the hoop are generally handsomely ornamented with oriental pictures.

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Classical Tambourines of Eastern origin.

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a, Ancient Tortoise Lyre. b, c, e, f, g, Grecian Lyres. h, Roman Lyre, from a coin of Nero. i, Lyre of Timotheus. j, Lyre from a Jewish Shekel of Simon Maccabeas.

WIND INSTRUMENTS.

We will conclude our notice of musical instruments by a description of those which are operated upon by air, the effect being produced by a vibration of a column of air passing through a tube. These instruments are of two kinds; one operated upon by atmospheric air, the other by vital air. Of the former kind, we have only the organ, apollocon and accordeon. The latter kind embraces the trumpet, cornet, horn, clarion, clarionet, bagpipe, flagelet, fife, flute, hautboy or oboe, sackbut, serpent, and trombone.

The earliest wind instruments of which history furnishes a record, is the trumpet, horn, or cornet (all similar), if we except the organ of Jubal, or the Pandean pipe. In the law of Moses for the regulation of the service of the temple, trumpets and horns are the only instruments mentioned, and these are found upon many of the earlier Greek monuments.

a, Trumpet or funeral Pipe, from an ancient tomb at Troy; b, smaller of the same kind, from Herculaneum.

Upon the triumphal arch of Titus at Rome, are represented the trumpets used in the temple at the time that general besieged and destroyed Jerusalem. A majority of them were long, straight tubes, with a flaring end, much after the form of those in use at the present day. Such, as well as the curved ones, also appear in Egyptian paintings and sculptures. Rossilini in his "History of Music," gives an account of a painting in an Egyptian tomb, representing a battle-piece, in which a trumpeter, with two instruments, is conspicuously seen; and, compared with the trumpeter's stature, appear to be about eighteen inches in length. Although classed under the head of musical instruments, yet it is

WIND INSTRUMENTS.

113 el probable that the trumpet was used anciently only for religious or military purposes generally; although we have reason to believe that the trumpet and cornet formed a part of the choir of the temple service in the time of David. In the note to the sixth verse of the ninety-eighth Psalm, in the Pictorial Bible, we have an interesting description of the use of the trumpets in the temple. They were sounded exclusively by the priests, who stood apart and opposite to the Levitical choir, on the other side of the altar. They did not join in the concert, but sounded at certain intervals. They first gave a long, plain blast, then a blast with quavers, and lastly, a long, plain one again. This sounding, which is now practised upon military fields, is named by moderns tarantatara, and expresses the sound as nearly as possible. The trumpet sounded this tarantatara in the morning, to call the priests together; then again at sacrifice, and again at stated times-never less than seven, nor more than sixteen times during the day. The following cut represents the supposed appearance of a Levitical trumpeter with a curved instrument.

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Levitical Trumpeter.

Musical instruments having been found in the tombs of the Theban kings, of a date as early as the reign of Osymandyas, two thousand years before Christ, we are constrained to believe that music as a science was understood at that early age. From the Egyptians, the Greeks and Hebrews undoubtedly learned the science; and, according to the mythological tradition of the former, they received the art Modern Egyptian Flute. (Nay). from Lydia, where Amphion learned it, and from the Arcadian shepherds, who played upon the pipe, flute and eithern. The songs of the ancient Greeks were musical recitations accompanied by instruments; yet we have no account of music having been studied as a science until about six hundred years before CHRIST. It is said that Lasus, a Peloponnesian, who was the pupil of Pindar, wrote a treatise on music about five hundred and fifty years before CHRIST. Pythagoras attempted a mathematical analysis of tones, and it is said, that he added the eighth chord to the harp. In the times of Pericles and Socrates, Damon is mentioned as a distinguished teacher.

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From the first revival of the art in Europe, the greatest composers have directed their powers to the construction of sacred melodies, and indeed it would seem that such themes were alone adequate to a full exercise of refined musical powers. Of the

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