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Less is known about Ancient Roman music than is known about
the music of ancient Greece. There
is a number of at least partially extant sources on the music of
the Greeks. For example, much is known about the theories of Pythagoras and Aristoxenus (some of it
from Greek sources and some through the writings of later Roman
authors), and there exist about 40 deciphered examples of Greek
musical notation. Very little survives about the music of the
Romans, however. There are various reasons for this, one of which
is that early fathers of the Christian church were aghast at the
music of theatre, festivals, and pagan religion and suppressed it
once Christianity became the official religion of the Roman
empire.[1]
The Romans are not said to have been particularly creative or
original when it came to music. They did not attach any spiritual
ethos to music, as did the Greeks.[2] Yet, if
the Romans admired Greek music as much as they admired everything
else about Greek culture, it is safe to say that Roman music was
mostly monophonic (that is, single melodies with no harmony) and
that the melodies were based on an elaborate system of scales
(called 'modes').
The rhythm of vocal music may have followed the natural metre of
the lyrics.[3]
There were also other, non-Greek, influences on Roman culture –
from the Etruscans, for example, and, with imperial expansion, from
the Middle Eastern and African sections of the empire.[4] Thus there
were, no doubt, elements of Roman music that were native Latin as
well as non-European; the exact nature of these elements is
unclear.
Musical
notation
The Romans may have borrowed the Greek method[5] of
'enchiriadic notation' to record their music, if they used any
notation at all. Four letters (in English notation 'a', 'g', 'f'
and 'c') indicated a series of four succeeding tones with the range
of a tetrachord.
Rhythm signs, written above the letters, indicated the duration of
each note.
In the art of the period (eg the mosaics of Pompeii), none of the musicians are shown
reading music, and very few written examples have been
discovered.
Even the well-known writings of the late Roman philosopher, Boethius,[6] are more
of a treatise on the music of the ancient Greeks rather than a
description of contemporary music. The Romans might have tuned
their instruments to Greek modes. Familiar, perhaps, to the
modern ear would be the military calls on the trumpet-like
tuba, since all instruments of that nature only have
access to the same series of overtones bound by the laws of
physics.[7]
Musical
instruments
A wide variety of instruments are known to have been played by
the Romans, including instruments from within all the common
regions of a modern orchestra.
Blown
instruments
The
cornu, shown with a zoomorphic bell, from
Filippo
Bonanni's 1723 book
Gabinetto Armonico, a compendium
of illustrations of musical instruments.
- The tuba
— not the modern tuba, but a long and straight bronze trumpet with
a detachable, conical mouthpiece like that of the modern French
horn. Those found are about 1.3 metres long; they had a cylindrical
bore from the mouthpiece to the point where the bell flares
abruptly,[8] in a
fashion similar to that of the modern straight trumpet often seen
in presentations of 'period music', but there were no valves — one
instrument was capable only of a single overtone series. It was
essential to the military, providing 'bugle calls' and was
apparently borrowed from the Etruscans.
- The cornu — a somewhat more than
semi-circular (shaped like an upper-case letter 'G') bronze
instrument with or without a cross-bar/handle across the diameter.
It had a conical bore (like a modern French horn) and a conical
mouthpiece. Also used in the military and also borrowed from the
Etruscans.
- The aulos (the
Greek word, Latinised, was tibiae) — usually double,
consisting of two double-reed (as in a modern oboe) pipes, not
joined but generally played with a mouth-band to hold both pipes
steadily between the player's lips.[9] Modern
changes indicate that they produced a low, clarinet-like sound.
There is some confusion about the exact nature of the instrument;
alternate descriptions indicate each pipe having a single reed
(like a modern clarinet) instead of a double reed.
- The askaules
— a bagpipe.
- Versions of the modern flute
and panpipes
Plucked string
instruments
- The lyre, borrowed
from the Greeks, was essentially an early harp, with a frame of wood or tortoise shell and
various numbers of strings stretched from a cross bar to the
sounding body. The lyre was held or cradled in one arm and hand and
plucked with the other hand. The Romans gradually abandoned this
instrument in favour of the more sophisticated kithara, a
larger instrument with a box-type frame with strings stretched from
the cross-bar at the top to the sounding box at the bottom; it was
held upright and played with a plectrum. The strings were tunable
by adjusting wooden wedges along the cross-bar.[10]
- The lute, the true
forerunner of the guitar (kithara), is considered a medieval
instrument but was played by the ancient Romans. The Roman lute had
three strings and was not as popular as the lyre or the kithara,
but was easier to play.
- The kithara was the premier musical
instrument of ancient Rome and was played both in popular music and
in serious forms of music. Larger and heavier than a lyre, the
kithara was a loud, sweet and piercing instrument with precision
tuning ability. It was said some players could make it cry. From
kithara comes our word guitar and though the guitar more directly
evolved from the lute, the same mystique surrounds the guitar idols
of today as it did for the virtuoso kithara players, the
citharista, and popular singers of ancient Rome. Like other
instruments, it came originally from Greece and Greek images
portray the most elaborately constructed kitharas.
It was considered that the gods of music, the muses and Apollo,
gave kithara players their gift to mesmerise listeners.
Organs
**The
hydraulis. Note the presence of the curved trumpet,
the
cornu.
- The organ —
There are some mosaic images of organs and fragmentary remains in
the National Archaeological Museum of Naples. The pipes were sized
so as to produce many of the modes (scales) taken over from the
Greeks. From the fragments, the instruments seem to be a cross
between the bagpipe and the organ. It has not been established if
they were blown by the lungs or by some mechanical bellows. Of
greater interest is the hydraulis, an organ that worked by
water pressure. The instrument goes back to the ancient Greeks and
a well-preserved model in pottery was found at Carthage in 1885.
Essentially, the air to the pipes that produce the sound comes from
a mechanism of a wind-chest connected by a pipe to a dome; air is
pumped in to compress water, and the water rises in the dome,
compressing the air and causing a steady supply to reach the
pipes[11] (also see
Pipe
organ#History).
Percussion
- Variations of a hinged wooden or metal device (called a
scabellum) — a 'clapper' — used to beat time. Also, there
were various rattles, bells and tambourines.
- Drum and percussion
instruments like tympani and castanets, the Egyptian
sistrum, and brazen pans, served various musical and other purposes
in ancient Rome, including backgrounds for rhythmic dance,
celebratory rites like those of the Bacchantes, military uses,
hunting (to drive out prey) and even for the control of bees in
apiaries. Some Roman music was distinguished for its having a
steady beat, no doubt through the use of drums and the percussive
effects of clapping and stamping. Egyptian musicians often kept
time by snapping the fingers.
- The sistrum was a rattle
consisting of rings strung across the cross-bars of a metal frame,
which was often used for ritual purposes.
Music in
society
In spite of the purported lack of musical originality on the
part of the Romans, they did enjoy music greatly and used it for
many activities. Natasha[12] recounts
the obvious military uses of the tuba for signaling, as
well as music for funerals, private gatherings, public performances
on the stage and large gladiatorial spectacles. Music was also used
in religious ceremonies. It should be noted that the Romans
cultivated music as a sign of education.[13] Music
contests were quite common and attracted a wide range of
competition, including Nero
himself, who performed widely as an amateur and once traveled to Greece to compete.[14]
There are also numerous references (cited in Natasha[15]) to the
pervasive presence of music in ancient Rome, music even on a very
large scale — hundreds of trumpeters and pipers playing together at
massive games and festivals — and even of normally hand-held
kitharas built as large as carriages.
References
- Bonanni, Filippo (1964). Antique Musical Instruments and
their Players, Dover Publications reprint of the 1723 work,
Gabinetto armonico',' with supplementary explanatory material.
New York: Dover Publications.
- Boethius, Anicius Manlius Severinus. De institutione
musica. (English edition as Fundamentals of Music,
translated, with introduction and notes by Calvin M. Bower; edited
by Claude V. Palisca. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989.)
- Grout, Donald J., and Claude V. Palisca (1996). A History
of Western Music, New York: W.W. Norton.
- Pierce, John R (1983), The Science of Musical Sound,
New York: Scientific American Books.
- Scott, J. E. (1957). 'Roman Music' in The New Oxford
History of Music, vol.1: 'Ancient and Oriental Music,' Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
- Smith, William (1874). A Dictionary of Greek and Roman
Antiquities. New York: Harper.
- Suetonius.
Nero, xli, liv.
- Ulrich, Homer, and Paul Pisk (1963). A History of Music and
Musical Style. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanoich.
- Walter, Don C (1969) Me and Music in Western Culture,
New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
- Williams, C. F. (1903). The Story of the Organ. New
York: Charles Scribner & Sons.
Notes
- ^ Grout
- ^ Ulrich, p.
25
- ^ Grout
- ^ Scott, p.
404
- ^ Bonanni,
plate 2.
- ^ Bonanni,
plate 3.
- ^ Bonanni,
plate 48.
- ^ Williams.
- ^ Scott, p.
413
- ^ Walter,
p.23
- ^ Suetonius,
cited in Scott, p. 418.
- ^ Scott
- ^ Pierce, p.
45
Additional bibliography
- Comotti, G. (1989). Music in Greek and Roman Culture.
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1989.
- Hagel, Stefan, and Christine Harrauer (eds.). Ancient Greek
Music in Performance: Symposion Wien 29. Sept.–1. Okt. 2003.
Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften,
2005. ISBN 3700134754
- Landels, J. G. (1999). Music in Ancient Greece &
Rome. London and New York: Routledge.
- West, M. L. Ancient Greek Music. Oxford: Clarendon
Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. ISBN 0198148976
(cloth) ISBN 0198149751 (pbk)
- Wille, Günther. Musica Romana: Die Bedeutung der Musik im
Leben der Römer. Amsterdam: P. Schippers, 1967.
External
links
- Find Music - Online Music search.
- Musica Romana, musicarchaeology, scientific
review of ancient Roman music as well as performances, bibliography
and descriptions for instruments and notations online (English and
German).
- The Thesaurus Musicarum
Latinarum (TML), an evolving database of the entire corpus of
Latin music theory written during the Middle Ages and the
Renaissance.
- Synaulia, dedicated to the reconstruction of
historical musical instruments, sound theatre, dance on the basis
of ethnology.
- Greek origins of Roman
music
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