The actual character of this music we must gather from the writings about it, rather than the few fragments at hand for analysis. Just as music, because of its moral significance, became the subject of philosophic speculation, so did its scientific side appeal to the analytic mind of the Greeks, and their mathematicians and scientists in general expatiated at length upon its theory. From their writings we adduce first of all the fact that Greek music lacked at least one of the important elements of modern music, namely, polyphony—or harmony—the quality which of all, from a modern point of view, appeals most directly to our emotions, to our susceptibility, which is most closely associated with color and ‘mood.’ Investigators, such as Westphal, Gevaert, etc., have untiringly striven to establish evidence of something more than simple homophony in the music of antiquity, but beyond a slight deviation in the instrumental accompaniments, partaking of the nature of grace notes, they have discovered traces of nothing but melody at the unison—or at the distance of an octave, when men and boys (or women) sang together, or when the voice was accompanied by an instrument of higher or lower pitch. Such and nothing more is the import of the testimony of Aristotle, when he says: ‘Why is symphonous or antiphonal singing more pleasing than harmony? Is it not because it is the consonance of the octave? For antiphony is born of the voices of young boys and men, whose tones are equal in distance from each other as is the highest note of an octave from the lowest’ (Problems xix, 29). Curious as it may seem that it should never have occurred to a people intellectually so advanced to venture experiments in the field of polyphony; that it should never have entered their minds to strike two strings of the lyre or kithara simultaneously, or that an occasional false note struck along with the right one should not have suggested the possibilities of the ‘third dimension’ in music, it remains a fact that in all the mass of theoretical and technical writings upon the art sufficient to reconstruct the entire ‘system’ of Greek music,no mention is made of harmony or polyphony.[35]We can only conclude then that combinations other than the perfect consonance of the octave, all mixtures of sounds or a confusion of lines, were hostile to the Greek ideal of purity, to the underlying principle of classic simplicity.
Thus the Greeks, reduced to the resources of rhythm and melody as means of musical expression, developed these to a very high degree, in the fineness of its distinctions advanced even beyond the point which we have as yet found it necessary to reach in modern music. Their rhythm, while no doubt it had a distinct and independent existence, was primarily determined by the accent of the spoken word, the metres of poetry. Even if conceived as a musical entity, it must at all times be thought of as pertaining to the text rather than the melody. The earliest rhythm of which we have knowledge is the hexameter of the Homeric epics, and it is doubtful whether any variety in rhythmic structure was introduced until the introduction of the short iambic measures at a later period. Melody, on the other hand, while subjected to certain laws, and at first perhaps nothing more than a monotonous chant or declamation at slightly varying pitch, finally attained a variety of line and freedom of movement which rendered it capable of the most subtle shades of expression. This, we are informed, was due to a complex system of modes or scales, ofgeneraandchroai, which, if we understand them correctly, would credit the Greek ear with much finer distinctions of pitch than we are capable of to-day.
A full discussion of this system is beyond our present purpose, and the numerous controversies concerning it, which in many respects are still unsettled, place thematter outside the pale of true history; but a brief statement of its development (in historical sequence) is necessary for the comprehension of the terms which must recur in the course of our sketch.
We have seen that the Greeks recognized the consonance of the octave. Similarly they recognized at an early period the close relationship of the interval of the perfect fifth, and its inversion, the perfect fourth. The latter became the basis of the Greek system of scales. They divided the interval into unequal smaller intervals according to three methods, orgenera, in each case placing the larger steps at the top and the smaller at the bottom. (An equal division of the interval has, as far as we know, never been attempted and is entirely foreign to natural impulses.) The results obtained were as follows:
p99s1The Three Genera.
The Three Genera.
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Of these three tetrachords (from [Greek: tetra] = four and [Greek: chordon] = string) only the first was generally accepted, the chromatic was rarely used and the enharmonic probably only byvirtuosi, for we have the testimony of Aristoxenus that the ear accustomed itself only with difficulty to the distinction of quarter tones.
By joining two diatonic tetrachords together we obtain a series of notes corresponding to the Dorian scale or mode ([Greek: harmonia])—more properly ‘octave species’—which was accounted the oldest of all the modes:
p99s2Dorian.
Dorian.
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Associated with this we soon find the Phrygian mode, supposed to be of Asiatic origin and introduced into Greece by Terpander of Lesbos, one of the earliest known composers of antiquity:
p100s1Phrygian.
Phrygian.
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and also the Lydian, the name of which indicates its origin:
p100s2Lydian.
Lydian.
[PNG][[audio/mpeg]
Around these three may be grouped all the modes in use in classic times. These scales or octave species may be compared rather to our present major and minor modes than to our modern transposition scales, in that their identity is determinednotby their absolute pitch, but by the intrinsic character of each mode,based upon the distribution of the large and small steps or intervals within the octave. But here the analogy ends, for the Greek modes cannot really be thought of in the same way as either modern scales or modes, which by long association with our harmonic system have become inseparably identified with it, so that every step of the scale has a harmonic significance as well as a melodic. Hence, there is associated with our scales the idea oftonality, which in its modern sense is entirely foreign to Greek music. Nevertheless a distinct character orethoswas ascribed to their scales by the Greeks (just as our major and minor have their individual character). The Lydian, for instance, was thought of as plaintive and adaptable to songs of sorrow; the Dorian as manly and strong, hence to be employed in warlike strains; and so on.[36]
It will be seen that the above three scales correspond to the three series of notes comprised within the octaves from e to e´, d to d´, and c to c´, produced by the white keys of the piano. (While this does not indicate their absolute pitch, it represents the relative pitch at which they appear as part of the entire system, or ‘foundation scale,’ of the Greeks, illustrated on page 103.) By a transposition of the tetrachord divisions of each of these scales, the Greeks obtained two additional scales out of each of the above three. These derived scales were denoted by the prefixeshypoandhyper(low and high), respectively:
ilop101
(It is evident from this table that the Hypodorian corresponds to the Hyperphrygian, and the Hypophrygian to the Hyperlydian; hence there are only sevendifferentmodes.)
A common relationship was thus clearly recognized between the three scales of each group, which may be thought of as having one common tonic. It may be noted, however, that the Hypodorian probably had an independent existence before being associated with the Dorian, as is indicated by its own ethnological name of ‘Æolian,’ and as such was supposed to be of great antiquity. The Hyperdorian enjoyed an independent existence as ‘Mixolydian.’ Its invention has been variously ascribed to Sappho, Damon and Pythocleides.
We have seen how, by joining two tetrachords, the Greeks constructed their Dorian scale (octachord). By joiningadditionaltetrachords to this scale at either end they obtained their double octave scale or ‘Perfect Immutable System’:
p102score
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It should be noted, however, that the new tetrachords are addedconjunctively, i. e., so that one of their notes (e) coincides with the terminal notes of the original octave, while the two tetrachords making up that octave were placed in juxtaposition with a whole tone step between them. This was called the tone of disjunction (diezeuxis). For purposes of modulation (metabole) they now laid across the middle of this system an additional diatonic tetrachord (from d to a) in such a way that one of its tones (b♭) came half way between the two notes of thediezeuxis.[37]The low A was added to round out the octave. (It is a curious fact that what we calllowthe Greeks calledhighandvice versa.) The two tetrachordsMesonandHypaton, together with the conjunctive (Synemmenon), were also considered as an independent system called the Lesser Perfect System. The relation of these systems as well as the names of the individual notes are set forth on the accompanying table.
ilop103Double Octave Scale, or Perfect Immutable System
Double Octave Scale, or Perfect Immutable System
By carving out of the Greater Perfect System (which we may call simply the Complete System) overlapping octave sections, each beginning on a different note, theGreek theorists found these to correspond in their intervals to each of the seven different modes, as follows: Thus all scales came to be thought of theoretically as transpositions of the corresponding octave sections in the Complete System (Foundation Scale). Indeed, the entiresystemwas considered as transposed and the individual tones retained their names regardless of pitch, i. e., in the Dorian mode themesewould always be the fourth note from the bottom, in the Phrygian the fifth, etc.
p104s1
[PNG][[audio/mpeg]
As an example, let us transpose the Foundation Scale one tone above its natural pitch:
p104s2
The middle octave will now be seen to be Phrygian (corresponding to No. 3 above) instead of Dorian as before. Now in their system of transposition scales (in reality transposed Complete Systems) the Greeks gave to every scale the name corresponding to the mode of its middle octave. Before the time of Aristoxenus only seven of these transposition scales, or keys ([Greek: tonoi]) were in use. That theoretician eventually rounded out the scheme to eighteen (of which six appear in modern notation as duplicates or octave transpositions). He did this systematically by taking the interval of the perfect fifth as a basis and building on each semi-tone degree a group of three scales (natural, hypo, and hyper). As there were not enough of the original modes to supply names for all of the new scales, it was, of course, necessary to invent arbitrary names for the superfluous ones. By this achievement it was possible to transpose a melody into any one of the eighteen (or really twelve) keys without changing its modal character. We may therefore assume with some justification that Aristoxenus’ system in a way did for the Greeks what our own equal temperament has done for modern music.
We end our brief sketch of Greek theory at this point, which may be assumed as the highest development of the system. Later systems were either based on Aristoxenus or were of reactionary nature. We must, however, for a moment retrace our steps to explain briefly the achievements of an earlier theoretician, the great philosopher Pythagoras, in the field of musical acoustics.
Like many of the ancient philosophers, Pythagoras (ca.600 B. C.) is known only by his disciples and by their quotations from or commentaries on his teaching. Of these the most important are Archytas (400-365 B. C.) and the great mathematician Euclid (ca.300 B. C), though there is some reason to suppose the part of Euclid’s work dealing with music to have been written by Cleonides (ca.200 B. C.) and by the later Pythagorean Nichomachus (ca.150 A. D.).
In Hierocles’ Commentaries on the ‘Symbols’ and‘Golden Verses’ of Pythagoras, M. Dacier, the translator, amplifies the prefatory Life of Pythagoras found in Hierocles, and he recounts, as Gaudentius, Nichomachus, Macrobius, Boëtius, and others have recounted, the incident which drew the attention of the ancient founder of the great system of secret numbers to the numerical relations of Sound in Music. The quaint old story is as follows: ‘Pythagoras is honored with the Invention of Harmonical Measures; and ’tis related how it happened. They write, that one Day, after he had been meditating a long while on the Means of assisting the Hearing, as he had already found means of assisting the Sight, by the Rule, Compass, Astrolabe and other Instruments, and the Feeling, by the Balance and the Measures, he chanced to go by a Smith’s Shop, and heard several Hammers of different Sizes, beating Iron upon the Anvil. He was moved with the Justness of the Harmony, and going into the Shop, he examined the Hammers and their sound in regard to their Sizes; and, being returned home, he made an Instrument on the Wall of his Chamber, with Stakes that served for pegs and with strings of equal length, at the end of which he tied the different Weights, and by striking several of these strings at once he produced different Tones, and thereby learnt the Reasons of this different Harmony, and of the intervals that caused it.’
In general it may be pointed out that the Pythagorean system of harmonics was only incidental to philosophy. Thus Laloy, speaking of the musical system of Pythagoras, says: ‘One finds, amid their confused accounts and contradictory assertions, a body of rules and precepts which present a “Pythagoric life,” as there was an “Orphic life,” in which justice, order, friendship, abstinence, geometry, and music are an integral part ... even metempsychosis itself being merely the truth inherent in a number.’
The monochord, a single string stretched over a sliding bridge, was the basis of the acoustical experiments of Pythagoras. By shifting the position of the bridge he varied the pitch of this string. His great discovery, that which has rightly caused him to be regarded as the founder of a branch of acoustics, was that between the respective lengths of stretched strings which gave the three consonances of octave, fifth and fourth, there existed certain essentially simple relations, as follows: the octave was in the relation of a string of one half the length or double the length; in other words, the relation of 2/1; the fifth was in the relation of 3/2; and the fourth in the relation of 4/3. These intervals, apparently on account of the simplicity of their mathematical relationship, were henceforth regarded as consonant. All other intervals were dissonant, at any rate in theory. The essential difference between the mathematical theory of sound ratios as held by the Pythagoreans and that held in modern times lies in the conception of the Third. To the Greeks such an interval was entirely dissonant, not necessarily because it was displeasing to the ear, but because they either did not recognize its ratio as 4/5 or did not deem this ratio to fit in with the highly abstruse theology they had built up on other numerical ratios. The step of the Fifth was to the Pythagoreans not merely the fundamental, but also the only, basis for the determination of tone ratios, whereas to-day the Third and sometimes even the Seventh are taken into account.
As to the value that Pythagoras attached to these fundamentals, we may quote Hierocles: ‘Pythagoras,’ he says, ‘has a very particular Opinion concerning Musick, which nevertheless the Masters of that Science, after they have duly weigh’d it, will find Just and Reasonable. He condemned and rejected all judgment that was made of Musick by the ear: because he found the Sense of Hearing to be already so weaken’d anddecay’d, that it was no longer able to judge aright. He would have Men therefore judge of it by the Understanding, and by the analogical and proportionable Harmony. This in my opinion was to show that the Beauty of Musick is independent of the Tune that strikes the Ear, and consists only in the Reason, in the confirmity and in the Proportion, of which the Understanding is the only Judge.’ And he adds this remark: ‘As to what he said, that the Sense of Hearing was become weak and impotent, it agrees with this other Assertion of his, that the reason why Men did not hear the Musick of the Universe was the weakness and imbecility of their Nature, which they had corrupted and suffered to degenerate.’
The error of the Pythagoreans, it may be pointed out, did not lie in the misuse of experimental data, but in the philosophical deductions therefrom. To the followers of Pythagoras a harmonic consonance was not a perception, it was a thing the existence of which could be conceived independently, a thing as real as the string which had given it birth. Sound was to them, therefore, a distinct identity, possessing attributes pertaining only to itself, yet susceptible of impression from without; it was a number realized and concrete, a number simple and all-inclusive, but, above all, a series of numbers possessing a personality, the veiling power of which both illumined and obscured a myriad symbolisms. Strict Harmonic Consonance was the utmost of numerical potency, it was a divine thought, not embodied Being. How deeply this was felt to be a truth by the Pythagoreans is evidenced by the story told of the death of Pythagoras, when the great philosopher, turning to his disciples, gave as his last instruction “Always the monochord!”
As for the value of the Pythagorean school as a whole, it is manifest that it must be considered as a group of mystical speculators, professing to be studentsof music and claiming Pythagoras as their master, but, in actual verity, doing little more than reducing sounds to air vibrations and ascertaining the numerical relations of pitch. Lovers of music they were not, they were mathematical precisians, perceiving no beauty and hearing no inspiration in melodic sounds except in such wise as these fitted into an ordered sequence of arithmetical form.
The development of the Pythagorean school was rendered all the more self-centred by the vitality and strength of the Empiricists. This flourishing school of musical art was concerned with arbitrary regulations as to the most acceptable forms of composition. The Empiricists determined what melodies were suitable to certain instruments. They debarred the flute from certain festivals and admitted it to others, they decided upon the forms of construction of musical instruments, and, above all, they insisted upon the performance of certain compositions in the traditional style. While not avowedly hostile to the Pythagoreans, the Empirical school paid little heed to the mathematical speculations of the learned, and song and dance continued because music was an art. Great as was the symbolic majesty of the Monochord, the surging strain of the lyre meant infinitely more to the life of Ancient Greece.
The second great development of Greek musical philosophy is that of Aristoxenus (b. 354 B. C.), whose systemization of the transposition scales has already been mentioned. If Pythagoras established some of the fundamental rules of acoustics, Aristoxenus may be given the credit of establishing Musical Science; the former was a branch of a science, the second was the science of an art.
To put the essential principles of Aristoxenus in the simplest possible form it may be said that he established two principal rules: (1) that music acceptsSound as sounds heard by the ear, and that the science of music must be built upon the foundation of sounds that are heard; (2) that sound-functions exist, possessing properties of sonance not directly reducible to any simple or elemental numerical ratio. The work of Aristoxenus was a revolution in musical philosophy based upon the principle of music as an organic whole of sounds bearing a dynamic relation each to the other. Aristotle had not been able to break away from the old Pythagorean conception, but Aristoxenus brushed away the misty speculations of morality, the mathematical entanglements and the musty formalism that surround the music of his time and set himself to answer the one vital question: Why does Music employ certain sounds and reject certain others?
The third stage of development of Greek music may be represented by Claudius Ptolemy, who lived in the second century of theChristianera. He may, with considerable authority, be deemed the inventor of the first interpreter of the equal tempered scale. R. C. Phillips has thrown considerable light upon the disputed questions involved in this matter, and to his monograph on the ‘Harmonic Tetrachords of Claudius Ptolemy’ (1904) we may refer the reader desirous of detailed information. Leaving the question of theory, we now proceed to pick up the thread of mythical story and trace what we can of the history of Greek composition.
All legendary references to the prehistoric era of Greek music point to its importation into Hellas by various artists, partly from the North (Thessaly and Thrace) and partly from the East (Asia Minor). In this we see probably nothing more than a racial recollection of the Dorian migration, which, as we know, took place about the year 1104 B. C. Orpheus, ofwhom we have already spoken, must be counted among the Northerners, the Thracians, for his native place was Pieria at the foot of Mt. Olympus. His pupil, Musaios, was supposed to have lived in Athens, and his son Eumolpos was the progenitor of the famous family of priests and singers which were entrusted perpetually with the rites of the Eleusinian mysteries, sacred to Demeter. Amphion, another of the Northern artists (the miraculous builder of the walls of Thebes), is described by Pausanias (Græco-Roman historian, 2d Cent., A. D.) as a relative of Tantalos of Lydia, and to have brought from there the Lydian mode. He is also credited with having increased the lyre from four to seven strings. Heraclides Ponticus calls him the founder of thekitharœdicschool of poetry, which was governed by a method and laws distinct from theauleticschool, associated with the aulos, the Grecian flute, from which it took its name. The regulation of the cult of Apollo at Delphi is ascribed to Philammon, whose son Thamyris, a native of the more uncultured regions of Thrace, was said to have challenged the muses to contest, and to have been punished for this offense with blindness.
Thus the North was, as we have seen, the home of the kitharœdic muse; Phrygia, on the other hand, must be considered as the cradle of the auletic school, of which the most prominent early names are Hyagnis, Marsyas, and Olympus, the three oldest players upon the flute. The first of these was said to be the inventor of that art. Marsyas was his son and first disciple, while Olympus introduced the art into Greece and became the first Hellenic master of artistic instrumental music.[38]
The first distinct period of musical composition is that of thenomoi(sing.nomos; Gr. [Greek: nomos] = law), a certain type of melodies constructed according to fixed rules, which were sung as solos to verses whose subject was usually the praise of some god. (The singers performing them were known asaœdsand later as rhapsodists.) The earliestnomoiwere melodies of very simple structure, but from the first there is a distinction between the kitharœdic and auletic types, the first of which is supposed to have followed the Homeric hexameter (iambic metre), and the latter to have been based on the elegiac measures, offering, however, a considerable variety of rhythm.
The pioneer representatives of these two opposing schools were, respectively, Olympus, already familiar to us, and Terpander, both of whom belong to the seventh century B. C. Concerning Olympus’ art a startling assertion is found in Plutarch. He was regarded by Greek musicians as the originator of the enharmonic genus. Upon clearer examination, it has been found that this use of the word ‘enharmonic’ does not coincide with the sense in which it is used above, where we explained the threegeneraof tetrachords. The quarter-tone division is, indeed, a much later product and does not seem ever to have attained to great popularity. The enharmonic scale of Olympus simply consisted of the diatonicwith a step omitted, so as to avoid all semi-tone intervals in the melodies. This elided tone was probably the Lichanos of the Phrygian scale ([Greek: harmonia]), or f, if we take the octave from d to d´ on the white keys of the piano. The Phrygian was naturally the scale used by Olympus, whose home was Phrygia, but he is also said to have introduced this ‘enharmonic’ type of melody into the Dorian mode. When the full octachord came into consideration (originally the scale was limited to sevennotes) the omission of the upper tone of the higher semi-tone interval (from b to c) followed as a matter of course. Thus Terpander’s ‘enharmonic’ scale is seen to be simply a sort of pentatonic system, the antiquity of which is already evident from our examination of primitive music.
Little is known of Olympus’ life. What part of Greece he inhabited we are not told. It seems certain that he practised his art in the service of Apollo. About one hundred years before the beginning of the Pythic games at Delphi he composed a song describing the fight of Apollo with the dragon, which afterward became known as theNomos Pythicos, and which, as we have seen, was regularly performed upon the first day of the Pythic festivals.[39]
Of Terpander, however, the first of thekitharœdicnome writers, we have many isolated details, both of legend and fact. There is a story that the lyre of Orpheus was carried on the waves of the sea from the Thracian coast to Antissa on Lesbos, where Terpander was born. Orpheus is, indeed, the singer whom Terpander was said to emulate, while Olympus was supposed to follow the models of Homer. Terpander was the first victor in the SpartanCarneata(festival in honor of Apollo), which began during the twenty-sixth Olympiad. This indicates his settling in Sparta, which is further confirmed by Plutarch, who in hisDe musicacalls him the chief representative of the first period in which Sparta flourished musically. Plutarch also records the legend that he successfully subdued a revolt of the Lacedemonians by the power of his music. To us the most important item of Terpander’s achievements is the addition of the eighth string to the lyre (kithara), thus completing the octave.
The next musician of extraordinary importance was Archilochos of Paraos, whose period has been fixed as 675-630. His popularity seems to have surpassed that of any other except Homer, with whom he was equal in the estimation of the ancients. His literary merit consists of the introduction into artistic poetry of the iambic and trochaic trimeter and tetrameter and the origination of the strophic form, by the alternation of shorter verses of different rhythm with longer ones. Similarly, his greatmusicalachievement is the introduction of rhythmical change and the use of faster time. In using shorter measures he endowed his compositions with a certain folk-quality which, combined with the element of satire and fable, quickly brought them into popular favor. Archilochos was a pugnacious, combative character; he had taken part in the wars on Eubœa and found his death in a warlike exploit on Nasos. His invective and satirical poems were a totally new departure in Greek poetry. A peculiar practice, which in a sense survives in the method of our musical comedians, was introduced by Archilochos for humoristic effect, i. e., the interrupting of the song proper by the spoken word, followed by a return to the melody after a brief instrumental interlude. This was known asparacataloge. Its use was later transferred to the serious ode and even the tragedy. A reference in Plutarch to Archilochos’ accompaniments ‘under the vocal part, whereas the old ones sang everything in unison’ has aroused considerable controversy. We shall dismiss it with the well-supported conclusion of Riemann, that it does not point to any form of heterophony, but to certain methods of interluding, rhythmical ornamentation and playing in the upper octave (flageolet).
The strophic forms of Archilochos constituted thepreliminary steps toward the development of lyric poetry, which, founded in the seventh century, ‘raised its graceful structure in the sixth.’ Alkman and Stesichoros furnish the transition to this subjective school, whose disciples are essentially the celebrants of love and wine. According to dialects it falls into three divisions—the Ionian, Dorian, and Æolian. The last, rooted in the kitharœdic school of Terpander, finds in its Lesbian home its first exponents—Alkaios and Sappho.
Alkaios (625-575 B. C.), son of a noble family of Mitylene, composed no less than ten books of sacred hymns and drinking, love, and war songs, in which the predominating note is the hate of tyranny and the joys of the banquet. His contemporary, Sappho, whose verses are likewise full of passion and pathos, takes flaming love as her theme, and a number of other Greek women poets of the sixth century follow her example. ‘The poems of Alkaios and Sappho are the most melodious of Greek creations.... Their fluent strophes, so easily subjected to musical treatment, have not only in antiquity but throughout a series of centuries been regarded as a fixed form’ (cf. the Odes of Horace). Ibykos and Anakreon, both living in the second half of the sixth century, belong to the same category. Both were wandering singers. The former is known to us through Schiller’s poem perpetuating the legend of the cranes; the latter is still a byword for the joy of life and the praise of love, wine, and song.
A group of auletic musicians living in the seventh century, to which belonged Xenokritos, Polymnestos, and Thaletas, is credited with new developments in the musical practice of Sparta, which were soon transferred to the other Hellenic states as well. This great and far-reaching innovation was the introduction of the choral dances.
The cradle of the dance was said to be the island of Crete. Thence came Thaletas, the most important of the group of composers just mentioned. His fame reached the Spartans, who summoned him to organize aPæanin honor of Apollo, in order to allay the pest,[40]and this inaugurated his extended activity in Sparta, where he introduced also thepyrrhic([Greek: pyrrhíchê]), a rapidly moving dance, and thegymnopædia([Greek: gymnopaidia]) festival dances performed annually in honor of those who fell at Thyrea. In the regular order of gymnastic dance education the last named were first, then came thepyrrhics, and finally the ‘stage dances,’ including the famoushyporchemas—pantomimic dances—which doubtless were a development in the direction of the drama.
According to a description of Athenæus thegymnopædiasresembled the regular wrestling of the palæstra, for all the young boys danced naked and executed rhythmic body motions and responsive movements of the hands. Thepyrrhic, which, according to Aristoxenus, was not an importation but of native Spartan origin, was a sort of war dance, which later, however, took on a bacchic character, rods and torches displacing the spears. It is recorded that marching songs, accompanied by rhythmic motions, were popular in Sparta from early times, and in the second Messenian war (685 B. C.) inspired the warriors to victory. The wordhyporchema, defined as a pantomimic dance, ‘in its narrowest sense signifies the pantomimic representation of the action described by the words’ (Athenæus, i. 15). The same authority says that ‘while the chorus danced, it sang’ and that ‘some of the hymns were danced and some were not, just as the Pæans were sung either with or without dancing.’ Amongthe hyporchemas are also included a great number of individual actions which made up the ceremonial of the great religious festivals and games, such as the gathering of the laurels for the victor, the garnering of the grapes, the bringing in of the tripod. To them belong also the so-called ‘Prosodies,’ sung to the accompaniment of the aulos during the processional into the temple or the approach to and withdrawal from the altar. All choral dancing was of course closely associated with music. And, while the monodic forms of composition continued to flourish, choral music came to stand highest in the public favor. The charm of variety afforded by a combination of the two was, moreover, quickly recognized.
The development of this choral music was the particular mission of a school of lyricists no less celebrated than the Æolian—namely, the Dorian. It was considered the highest form of lyricism. Larger periods and great variety, instead of short and regular strophes, distinguish its form, while its spiritual import is correspondingly broader. Thehymnæ(bridal choruses); thescolia(praising a celebrated personality), out of which grew the encomium (song of praise), and theepinikion, sung in praise of the victors at the great festival games, are said to have introduced the softer, subjective, essentially lyrical element into the chorus. The dithyramb, originally a Bacchic festival song in honor of the god of wine (Dionysos), represents the highest of lyric choral forms. It originated in Phrygia, was developed artistically by Arion, living at the court of Periander in Corinth (628-585 B. C.), but was cultivated principally at Athens, first through Lasos of Hermione. Arion was the first to assemble a large chorus—50 men and boys—forming a circle around the altar of Dionysos, with a flute player in the centre. Before him Tyrtæus (685 B. C.) was said to have originated the division of thechorus into three parts—‘children, men, and old men’—but earlier than that we learn from Pollux of the partition of the chorus into two semi-choirs, which sang in responsive or antiphonary manner.
Simonides of Keos and Pindar are the chief figures of choral lyricism. The former, born on the isle of Keos (Ionia), lived first at the court of Hipparch in Athens, after whose assassination he went to Thessaly. After the battle of Marathon (490) he reappeared at Athens with an elegy upon the fallen warriors, which left him victor over Æschylus, the founder of the drama. He also won the dithyrambic contest in 471, and he died at the court of Hierons of Syracuse. The reproach of commercialism, made against Simonides because of his acceptance of favors and pay at the hand of rulers, reminds one of present-day criticism. In contrast to him, Pindar (522-448), the illustrious master, revered not less than Homer himself, was a retiring personality, ‘living for himself rather than others.’ He was born at Thebes. His life story has been embellished with legend and fiction, indicating the nation’s affection for him. He participated frequently in the national festivals and, it is related, found his death on the stage of the theatre at Argos. His works combine no less than seventeen books containing hymns, pæans, dithyrambs,parthenias,hyporchemas, encomiums,thernoi epinikia, and other forms, all intended for choral performance. His first Pythic ode is among the six fragments of Greek music preserved to us.
We must now consider what is perhaps the greatest and the most original creation of the Greek mind—the drama. Its forms we have seen in lyric poetry and in pantomimic dances of the chorus, furnishing the elements of dialogue and representative action. These forms are to be found independently among other nations of antiquity, but their combination is peculiarto the Greeks, to whom the entire world is indebted for the art of the theatre. Like the dithyrambic chorus, whose close connection with the worship of Dionysos we have observed, the drama was perpetually associated with these Bacchic festivals. The very name tragedy (from [Greek: tragos] = goat) indicates its root form—the satyr play, executed by men disguised with fur skin and the cloven hoof to represent the votaries of the God. Here is added another element of the drama—impersonation—though earlier cases of it are seen, for instance, in the disguise of the poet Chrysothemis as the god Apollo, when performing his compositions. Allegory and symbolism were things to which the Greek mind naturally inclined. Mythological conceptions were often visualized, such as the favorite fight of Apollo and the dragon, the myth of Demeter and Persephone represented in the Eleusinian mysteries, etc. The word [Greek: dran] is the general expression for secret action in the Pagan cult, hence in the antique drama, no less than our own opera, we may recognize a sacred origin (cf. Chap. XI, p. 325). The dithyrambic chorus, whose members themselves are thought to have been disguised as satyrs, furnished the last preparatory step leading to the tragedy, which, it should be noted, gradually developed out of the non-choral sections, the solo speeches of the leaders.[41]Similarly, the Comedy had its beginning in the rather coarse witticisms of the choral leaders in the Bacchic processions of the Dionysos festival (cf. Aristotle, ‘Poetics,’ 4).
The first real dramatist was Thespis, who, in 536 B. C., was summoned to Athens by the Pisistratides to produce a tragedy in which for the first time there appeared an actor outside of the chorus. It developedrapidly from then on—we need only mention the introduction of the comedy by Epicharmos (540-450) and its official sanctioning in Athens in 487. Phrynichos, the greatest dramatist before Æschylus, is remembered by the performance of the ‘Fall of Milet’ for which, because it reminded the Athenians of their defeat, he was punished, and the political tragedy henceforth forbidden. The names of the three greatest tragic poets, Æschylus (525-456), Sophocles (496-406), and Euripides (450-395), are too well known to require comment. Our present task is simply to point out the important part which music played in their works. The parallel frequently drawn between the modern opera or music drama on the one hand, and the classic tragedy on the other, we may dismiss with the statement of Riemann, that ‘the classic tragedy was a drama in which music as such coöperated, while in the modern (music drama) music occupies an eminently dominating place.’ We might add that, whereas we speak, for instance, of Wagner as being his own librettist, we might say of Euripides that he supplied his own music for his drama.
The three elements of modern opera—soloists, chorus, and orchestra—were, indeed, represented in the classic drama. The soloists were the actors (whosangmost of their speeches) and the chorus leader with his assistants, who were sometimes drafted to the stage proper, to take part in the action. The chorus consisted of fifteen members in the tragedy, twenty-four in the comedy. It was placed on a lower eminence than the principals (on the ‘orchestra’) and represented at first (with Æschylus and Sophocles) the ‘moral consciousness of the people.’ Later, with Euripides, its contemplative function was superseded by its actual participation in the action as a mob. It sang together—ortutti, as we would say—theparadosandaphodos, the processional and recessional choruses—for whichthe chorus was sometimes divided into sections, appearing one after the other, as, for instance, in the ‘Seven against Thebes,’ and thestasima, interspersed through the action. The choral dance of the tragedy, festive and stately, was calledemmeleia; that of the satyr play, grotesque and rapid, thesikinnis, and the lampooning, lascivious dance of the comedy,cordax. The ‘orchestra’ consisted of one simple flute player, who used the doubleaulos. This was traditionally the characteristic ‘orgiastic’ instrument. The kithara, despite its popularity in other uses, was never admitted to the tragedy. The chief function of the flute may have been to keep the chorus ‘in tune,’ but it is certain that it played interludes, etc., and at times solo numbers, for we know that aulos playing had become a highly developed technical practice, and that aulos virtuosi achieved great reputations and were highly esteemed.
This leads us to the question of instrumental practice in general, the brief consideration of which is our next task.
One of the most ancient musical controversies was that regarding the respective merits of wind and string instruments. How it resulted in a most important victory for the latter is revealed in the partly mythical story of Marsyas, a Phrygian satyr. According to this legend Marsyas found upon the banks of a stream a flute, probably the double flute, which Athena had thrown away because she feared that blowing upon it would injure her beauty. Being a satyr, and therefore not so sensitive upon the point of personal attractions as the goddess, Marsyas set himself to learn the use of the instrument, and, in course of time, grewso proficient that he challenged Apollo to a contest, the god to use the lyre, the satyr the pipe. Apollo played a simple melody, but Marsyas, following, executed a number of variations upon this tune which compelled the judge to admit that in the first test victory belonged to the satyr. Apollo then played again, accompanying himself with the voice, and this Marsyas could not surpass; he objected, however, on the ground that the voice and the lyre were two instruments, while he was using only one. Apollo retorted that Marsyas used both mouth and fingers for his pipe, hence he had the right to use his mouth as well. The judges agreed with Apollo and the second test was awarded to the god. But when the third test came Apollo scorned to use the voice, and burst out in such a strain of melody as even Mount Olympus had never heard before, the music of the immortals which no satyr could hope to compass. Marsyas was flayed alive by Apollo as a sufficient declaration of his defeat.
Thus the myth. It has its reflection in fact. For the ancient national music of the lyre prevailed in Greece over the foreign Phrygian double flute and the latter was regarded as a barbarian instrument, finding its place only in vintage festivals, bacchanalian orgies, and, finally, into the chorus of the tragic drama.
The lyre and the aulos, then, are the arch-types of the two great classes of instruments—string and wind—which the Greeks used. That there were a great number of varieties we gather from their representation on monuments, vases, etc., and from the writings of classic authors. Taking the string instruments as the oldest—for mythical references to these go farthest back into antiquity—we find first the lyre, and then its more graceful sister, thekithara(orphorminx), which were in common use in the north, on the islands and the coast of Asia Minor. The lyre, originally made of the shell of a tortoise, had an arched soundbox, while the kithara’s was flat; the latter’s body was larger and more angular in shape. Both had originally four, subsequently seven, strings, which were added to in later periods till eleven was reached. These were fastened in a base at the lower end of the instrument and ran across a ‘bridge’ to the cross-piece connecting the two arms, which acted also as tuning peg. The sounding board had in the centre a resonance opening.