Part 8

Westphal (_Harmonik und Melopöie_, 1863, p. 255) supposes a much deeper corruption. He would restore [Greek: ta de lydia [kai iastia hoi tou migmatos tou syntonou diatonou tou ... ta de ...] hoi tou toniaiou diatonou tou Dôriou]. This introduces a serious discrepancy between the two passages, as the number of scales in the second list is raised to eight (Westphal making [Greek: iastia] and [Greek: iastiaioliaia] distinct scales, and furthermore inserting a new scale, of unknown name). Moreover the (unknown) scale of unmixed [Greek: diatonon toniaion] is out of its place at the end of the list. Westphal's objection to [Greek: lydia] as the name of a scale of the _Dorian_ species of course only holds good on his theory of the Modes.

The only other differences between the two passages are:

(1) In the scales of the lyre called [Greek: malaka] the admixture, according to i. 16, is one of [Greek: chrômatikon syntonon], according to ii. 16 of [Greek: chr. malakon]. But, as Westphal shows, Soft Chromatic is not admitted by Ptolemy as in practical use. It would seem that in the second passage the copyist was led astray by the word [Greek: malaka] just before.

(2) The [Greek: iastia] of i. 16 is called [Greek: iastiaioliaia] in ii. 16. We need not suppose the text to be faulty, since the two forms may have been both in use.

Another point overlooked in Westphal's treatment is that [Greek: diatonon syntonon] and [Greek: d. ditoniaion] are not really distinguished by Ptolemy. In one passage (i. 16) he gives his [Greek: lydia] and [Greek: iastia] as a mixture with [Greek: d. syntonon], adding that in practice it was [Greek: d. ditoniaion]. In the other (ii. 16) he speaks at once of [Greek: d. ditoniaion]. This consideration brings the two places into such close agreement that any hypothesis involving discrepancy is most improbable.

In practice it appears that musicians tuned the tetrachord _b-e_ of this scale with the Pythagorean two Major tones and [Greek: leimma].

Of the remaining scales one, called [Greek: hypertropa], is Phrygian in species (_d-d_), and of the standard genus:

_d_ 9/8 _e_ 28/27 _f_ 8/7 _g_ 9/8 _a_ 9/8 _b_ 28/27 _c_ 8/7 _d_

One, called [Greek: iastia], or [Greek: iastiaioliaia], is of the Hypo-phrygian or _g_-species, the tetrachord _b-e_ being 'highly strung' Diatonic or (in practice) Pythagorean, viz.:

_g_ 9/8 _a_ 9/8 _b_ 256/243 _c_ 9/8 _d_ 9/8 _e_ 28/27 _f_ 8/7 _g_

Regarding the tonality of these scales there is not very much to be said. In the case of the Hypo-dorian and Dorian octaves it will be generally thought probable that the key-note is _a_ (the [Greek: mesê kata dynamin]). If so, the difference between the two species is not one of 'mode,'--in the modern sense,--but consists in the fact that in the Hypo-dorian the compass of the melody is from the key-note upwards, while in the Dorian it extends a Fourth below the key-note. It is possible, however, that the lowest note (_e_) of the Dorian octave was sometimes the key-note: in which case the _mode_ was properly Dorian. In the Phrygian octave of Ptolemy's description the key-note cannot be the Fourth or Mesê [Greek: kata thesin] (_g_), since the interval _g-c_ is not consonant (9/8 × 9/8 × 28/27 being less than 4/3). Possibly the lowest note (_d_) is the key-note; if so the scale is of the Phrygian mode (in the modern sense). In the Hypo-phrygian octave there is a similar objection to regarding the Mesê [Greek: kata thesin] (_c_) as the key-note, and some probability in favour of the lowest note (_g_). If the Pythagorean division of the tetrachord _g-c_ were replaced by the natural temperament, which the language used by Ptolemy[1] leads us to regard as the true division, the scale would exhibit the intervals--

_g_ 5/4 _b_ 6/5 _d_ 7/6 _f_ 8/7 _g_

which give the natural chord of the Seventh. This however is no more than a hypothesis.

It evidently follows from all this that Ptolemy's octaves do not constitute a system of _modes_. They are merely the groups of notes, of the compass of an octave, which are most likely to be used in the several keys, and which Ptolemy or some earlier theorist chose to call by the names of those keys.

[Footnote 1: _Harm._ i. 16 [Greek: plên kathoson adousi men akolouthôs tô dedeigmenô syntonô diatonikô, kathaper exestai skopein apo tês tôn oikeiôn autou logôn parabolês, harmozontai de heteron ti genos] (sc. the Pythagorean), [Greek: xynengizon men ekeinô, k.t.l.]]

§ 32. _Remains of Greek Music._

The extant specimens of Greek music are mostly of the second century A.D., and therefore nearly contemporary with Ptolemy. The most considerable are the melodies of three lyrical pieces or hymns, viz. (1) a hymn to Calliope, (2) a hymn to Apollo (or Helios),--both ascribed to a certain Dionysius,--and (3) a hymn to Nemesis, ascribed to Mesomedes[2]. Besides these there are (4) some short instrumental passages or exercises given by Bellermann's _Anonymus_ (pp. 94-96). And quite recently the list has been increased by (5) an inscription discovered by Mr. W. M. Ramsay, which gives a musical setting of four short gnomic sentences, and (6) a papyrus fragment (now in the collection of the Arch-duke Rainer) of the music of a chorus in the _Orestes_ of Euripides. These two last additions to our scanty stock of Greek music are set out and discussed by Dr. Wessely of Vienna and M. Ruelle in the _Revue des Études Grecques_ (V. 1892, pp. 265-280), also by Dr. Otto Crusius in the _Philologus_, Vol. LII, pp. 160-200[1].

[Footnote 2: It seems needless to set out these melodies here. The first satisfactory edition of them is that of Bellermann, _Die Hymnen des Dionysius und Mesomedes_ (Berlin, 1840). They are given by Westphal in his _Musik des griechischen Alterthumes_ (1883), and by Gevaert, _Musique de l'Antiquité_, vol. i. pp. 445 ff.; also in Mr. W. Chappell's _History of Music_ (London, 1874), where the melodies of the first and third hymns will be found harmonised by the late Sir George Macfarren.

The melody published by Kircher (_Musurgia_, i. p. 541) as a fragment of the first Pythian ode of Pindar has no attestation, and is generally regarded as a forgery.]

The music of the three hymns is noted in the Lydian key (answering to the modern scale with one [symbol: flat]). The melody of the second hymn is of the compass of an octave, the notes being those of the Perfect System from Parhypatê Hypatôn to Tritê Diezeugmenôn (_f - f_ with one [symbol: flat]). The first employs the same octave with a lower note added, viz. Hypatê Hypatôn (_e_): the third adds the next higher note, Paranêtê Diezeugmenôn (_g_). Thus the Lydian key may be said, in the case of the second hymn, and less exactly in the case of the two others, to give the Lydian or _c_-species of the octave in the most convenient part of the scale; just as on Ptolemy's system of Modes we should expect it to do.

This octave, however, represents merely the _compass_ (_ambitus_ or _tessitura_) of the melody: it has nothing to do with its _tonality_. In the first two hymns, as Bellermann pointed out, the key-note is the Hypatê Mesôn; and the mode--in the modern sense of that word--is that of the octave _e - e_ (the Dorian mode of Helmholtz's theory). In the third hymn the key-note appears to be the Lichanos Mesôn, so that the mode is that of _g-g_, viz. the Hypo-phrygian.

[Footnote 1: Of the discovery made at Delphi, after most of this book was in type, I hope to say something in the _Appendix_.]

Of the instrumental passages given by the _Anonymus_ three are clearly in the Hypo-dorian or common mode, the Mesê (_a_) being the key-note. (See Gevaert, i. p. 141.) A fourth (§ 104) also ends on the Mesê, but the key-note appears to be the Parhypatê Mesôn (_f_). Accordingly Westphal and Gevaert assign it to the Hypo-lydian species (_f - f_). In Westphal's view the circumstance of the end of the melody falling, not on the key-note, but on the Third or Mediant of the octave, was characteristic of the Modes distinguished by the prefix _syntono-_, and accordingly the passage in question is pronounced by him to be Syntono-lydian. All those passages, however, are mere fragments of two or three bars each, and are quoted as examples of certain peculiarities of rhythm. They can hardly be made to lend much support to any theory of the Modes.

The music of Mr. Ramsay's inscription labours under the same defect of excessive shortness. If, however, we regard the four brief sentences as set to a continuous melody, we obtain a passage consisting of thirty-six notes in all, with a compass of less than an octave, and ending on the lowest note of that compass. Unlike the other extant specimens of Greek music it is written in the Ionian key--a curious fact which has not been noticed by Dr. Wessely.

INSCRIPTION WITH MUSICAL NOTES.

[Music:

[Greek: hos-on zês phai-nou. mê-den hol-ôs sy ly-pou. pros o-li-gon es-ti to zên. to te-los ho chro-nos a-pai-tei.]

]

The notes which enter into this melody form the scale _f[Symbols: sharp]-g-a-b-c[Symbols: sharp]-d-e[-f[Symbols: sharp]]_, which is an octave of the Dorian species (_e - e_ on the white notes). Hence if _f_[Symbols: sharp], on which the melody ends, is the key-note, the _mode_ is the Dorian. On the other hand the predominant notes are those of the triad _a-c[Symbols: sharp]-e_, which point to the key of _a_ major, with the difference that the Seventh is flat (_g_ instead of _g_[Symbols: sharp]). On this view the music would be in the Hypo-phrygian mode.

However this may be, the most singular feature of this fragment remains to be mentioned, viz. the agreement between the musical notes and the _accentuation_ of the words. We know from the grammarians that an acute accent signified that the vowel was sounded with a rise in the pitch of the voice, and that a circumflex denoted a rise followed on the same syllable by a lower note--every such rise and fall being quite independent both of syllabic quantity and of stress or _ictus_. Thus in ordinary speech the accents formed a species of melody,--[Greek: logôdes ti melos], as it is called by Aristoxenus[1]. When words were _sung_ this 'spoken melody' was no longer heard, being superseded by the melody proper. Dionysius of Halicarnassus is at pains to explain (_De Comp. Verb._, c. 11), that the melody to which words are set does not usually follow or resemble the quasi-melody of the accents, _e.g._ in the following words of a chorus in the _Orestes_ of Euripides (ll. 140-142):--

[Greek: siga siga leukon ichnos arbylês tithete, mê ktypeite; apoprobat' ekeis' apopro moi koitas,]

[Footnote 1: _Harm._ p. 18 Meib. [Greek: legetai gar dê kai logôdes ti melos, to synkeimenon ek tôn prosôdiôn, to en tois onomasi; physikon gar to epiteinein kai anienai en tô dialegesthai].]

he notices that the melody differs in several points from the spoken accents: (1) the three first words are all on the same note, in spite of the accents; (2) the last syllable of [Greek: arbylês] is as high as the second, though that is the only accented syllable: (3) the first syllable of [Greek: tithete] is lower than the two others, instead of being higher: (4) the circumflex of [Greek: ktypeite] is lost ([Greek: êphanistai]), because the word is all on the same pitch; (5) the fourth syllable of [Greek: apoprobate] is higher in pitch, instead of the third. In Mr. Ramsay's inscription, however, the music follows the accents as closely as possible. Every acute accent coincides with a rise of pitch, except in [Greek: hoson], which begins the melody, and in [Greek: esti], for which we should perhaps read the orthotone [Greek: esti]. Of the four instances of the circumflex accent three exhibit the two notes and the falling pitch which we expect. The interval is either a major or a minor Third. In the other case ([Greek: zês) the next note is a Third lower: but it does not seem to belong to the circumflexed syllable. All this cannot be accidental. It leads us to the conclusion that the musical notes represent a kind of recitative, or imitation of spoken words, rather than a melody in the proper sense of the term.

If any considerable specimen of the music of Euripides had survived, it might have solved many of the problems with which we have been dealing. The fragment before us extends over about six lines in dochmiac metre (_Orestes_ 338-343), with the vocal notation: but no single line is entire. The key is the Lydian. The genus is either Enharmonic or Chromatic. Assuming that it is Enharmonic--the alternative adopted by Dr. Wessely--the characters which are still legible may be represented in modern notation as follows:

[Music: [_Euripides_, _Orestes 338-344_.

[Greek: (katolo)phy-ro-mai; ma-te-ros (haima sas ho d' ana)bak-cheu-ei; ho me-gas (olbos ou monimo)s en bro-tois; a-na (de laiphos hôs ti)s a-ka-tou tho-as ti-na(xas daimôn) kat-e-kly-sen (deinôn ponon) hôs pon-tou labrois k.t.l.

]

It should be observed that in the fragment the line [Greek: katolophyromai katolophyromai] comes before 338 ([Greek: materos k.t.l.]), not after it, as in our texts[1].

[Footnote 1: I need not repeat what is said by Dr. Wessely and M. Ruelle in defence of the genuineness of our fragment. They justly point to the remarkable coincidence that the music of this very play is quoted by Dionysius of Halicarnassus (_l. c._). It would almost seem as if it was the only well-known specimen of music of the classical period of tragedy.

The transcription of Dr. Crusius, with his conjectural restorations, will be found in the _Appendix_. I have only introduced one of his corrections here, viz. the note on the second syllable of [Greek: kateklysen].]

The notes employed, according to the interpretation given above, give the scale _g-a-a*-a#-d-e-e*_. If the genus is Chromatic, as M. Ruelle is disposed to think, they are _g-a-a#-b-d-e-f_. When these scales are compared with the Perfect System we find that they do not entirely agree with it. Whether the genus is Enharmonic or Chromatic the notes from _a_ to _e*_ (or _f_) answer to those of the Perfect System (of the same genus) from Hypatê Mesôn to Tritê Diezeugmenôn. But in either case the lowest note (_g_) finds no place in the System, since it can only be the Diatonic Lichanos Hypatôn. It is possible, however, that the scale belongs to the period when the original octave had been extended by the addition of a tone below the Hypatê--the note, in fact, which we have already met with under the name of Hyper-hypatê (p. 39). Thus the complete scale may have consisted of the disjunct tetrachords _a-d_ and _e-a_, with the tone _g-a_. It may be observed here that although the scale in question does not fit into the Perfect System, it conforms to the general rules laid down by Aristoxenus for the melodious succession of intervals. It is unnecessary therefore to suppose (as Dr. Wessely and M. Ruelle do) that the scale exhibits a _mixture_ of different genera.

It must be vain to attempt to discover the tonality of a short fragment which has neither beginning nor end. The only group of notes which has the character of a cadence is that on the word [Greek:(olo)phypomai], and again on the words [Greek: en brotois], viz. the notes _a# a* a_ (if the genus is the Enharmonic). The same notes occur in reversed order on [Greek: akatou] and [Greek: (kat)eklusen]. This seems to bear out the common view of the Enharmonic as produced by the introduction of an 'accidental' or passing note. It will be seen, in fact, that the Enharmonic notes (_a*_ and _e*_) only occur before or after the 'standing' notes (_a_ and _e_).

Relying on the fact that the lowest note is _g_, Dr. Wessely and M. Ruelle pronounce the mode to be the Phrygian (_g-g_ in the key with one [Symbols: flat], or _d-d_ in the natural key). I have already put forward a different explanation of this _g_, and will only add here that it occurs twice in the fragment, both times on a short syllable[1]. The important notes, so far as the evidence goes, are _a_, which twice comes at the end of a verse (with a pause in the sense), and _e_, which once has that position. If _a_ is the key-note, the mode--in the modern sense--is Dorian (the _e_-species). If _e_ is the key-note, it is Mixo-lydian (the _b_-species).

[Footnote 1: Dr. Crusius, however, detects a [Symbols: phi]; (the sign for _g_) over the first syllable of [Greek: kateklusen] and the second syllable of [Greek: pontou]. There is little trace of them in his facsimile.]

§ 33. _Modes of Aristides Quintilianus._

The most direct testimony in support of the view that the ancient Modes were differentiated by the succession of their intervals has still to be considered. It is the account given by Aristides Quintilianus (p. 21 Meib.) of the six Modes ([Greek: harmoniai]) of Plato's _Republic_. After describing the genera and their varieties the 'colours,' he goes on to say that there were other divisions of the tetrachord ([Greek: tetrachordikai diaireseis]) which the most ancient musicians used for the [Greek: harmoniai], and that these were sometimes greater in compass than the octave, sometimes less. He then gives the intervals of the scale for each of the six Modes mentioned by Plato, and adds the scales in the ancient notation. They are of the Enharmonic genus, and may be represented by modern notes as follows:--

Mixo-lydian _b-b*-c-d-e-e*-f-b_ Syntono-lydian _e-e*-f-a-c_ Phrygian _d-e-e*-f-a-b-b*-c-d_ Dorian _d-e-e*-f-a-b-b*-c-e_ Lydian _e*-f-a-b-b*-c-e-e*_ Ionian _e-e*-f-a-c-d_

Comparing these scales with the Species of the Octave, we find a certain amount of correspondence. As has been already noticed (p. 22), the names Syntono-lydian and Lydian answer to the ordinary Lydian and Hypo-lydian respectively. Accordingly the Lydian of Aristides agrees with the Hypo-lydian species as given in the pseudo-Euclidean _Introductio_. The Dorian of Aristides is the Dorian species of the _Introductio_, but with an additional note, a tone below the Hypatê.

The Phrygian of Aristides is not the Enharmonic Phrygian species; but it is derived from the diatonic Phrygian octave _d-e-f-g-a-b-c-d_ by inserting the enharmonic notes _e*_ and _b*_, and omitting the diatonic _g_. By a similar process the Mixo-lydian of Aristides may be derived from the diatonic octave _b-b_, except that _a_ as well as _g_ is omitted, and on the other hand _d_ is retained. If the scale of the Syntono-lydian is completed by the lower _c_ (as analogy would require), it will answer similarly to the Lydian species (_c-c_).

§ 34. _Credibility of Aristides Quintilianus._

But what weight can be given to Aristides as an authority on the music of the time of Plato? The answer to this question depends upon several considerations.

1. The date of Aristides is unknown. He is certainly later than Cicero, since he quotes the _De Republica_ (p. 70 Meib.). From the circumstance that he makes no reference to the musical innovations of Ptolemy it has been supposed that he was earlier than that writer. But, as Aristides usually confines himself to the theory of Aristoxenus and his school, the argument from silence is not of much value. On the other hand he gives a scheme of notation containing two characters, [Symbol: [] and [Symbol: *], which extend the scale two successive semi-tones beyond the lowest point of the notation given by Alypius[1]. For this reason it is probable that Aristides is one of the latest of the writers on ancient music.

[Footnote 1: This argument is used, along with some others not so cogent, in Mr. W. Chappell's _History of Music_ (p. 130).]

2. The manner in which Aristides introduces his information about the Platonic Modes is highly suspicious. He has been describing the various divisions of the tetrachord according to the theory of Aristoxenus, and adds that there were anciently other divisions in use. So far Aristides is doubtless right, since Aristoxenus himself says that the divisions of the tetrachord are theoretically infinite in number (p. 26 Meib.),--that it is possible, for example, to combine the Parhypatê of the Soft Chromatic with the Lichanos of the Diatonic (p. 52 Meib.). But all this concerns the genus of the scale, and has nothing to do with the species of the Octave, with which Aristides proceeds to connect it. It follows either that there is some confusion in the text, or that Aristides was compiling from sources which he did not understand.

3. The Platonic Modes were a subject of interest to the early musical writers, and were discussed by Aristoxenus himself (Plut. _de Mus._ c. 17). If Aristoxenus had had access to such an account as we have in Aristides, we must have found some trace of it, either in the extant _Harmonics_ or in the quotations of Plutarch and other compilers.

4. Of the four scales which extend to the compass of an octave, only one, viz. the Dorian, conforms to the rules which are said by Aristoxenus to have prevailed in early Greek music. The Phrygian divides the Fourth _a-d_ into four intervals instead of three, by the sequence _a b b* c d_. As has been observed, it is neither the Enharmonic Phrygian species (_c e e* f a b b* c_), nor the Diatonic _d-d_, but a mixture of the two. Similarly the Mixo-lydian divides the Fourth _b_-_e_ into four intervals (_b b* c d e_), by introducing the purely Diatonic note _d_. The Lydian is certainly the Lydian Enharmonic species of the pseudo-Euclid; but we can hardly suppose that it existed in practical music. Aristoxenus lays it down emphatically that a quarter-tone is always followed by another: and we cannot imagine a scale in which the highest and lowest notes are in no harmonic relation to the rest.

5. Two of the scales are incomplete, viz. the Ionian, which has six notes and the compass of a Seventh, and the Syntono-lydian, which consists of five notes, with the compass of a Minor Sixth. We naturally look for parallels among the defective scales noticed in the _Problems_ and in Plutarch's dialogues. But we find little that even illustrates the modes of Aristides. The scales noticed in the _Problems_ (xix. 7, 32, 47) are hepta-chord, and generally of the compass of an octave. In one passage of Plutarch (_De Mus._ c. 11) there is a description--quoted from Aristoxenus--of an older kind of Enharmonic, in which the semitones had not yet been divided into quarter-tones. In another chapter (c. 19) he speaks of the omission of the Tritê and also of the Nêtê as characteristic of a form of music called the [Greek: spondeiakos tropos]. It may be said that in the Ionian and Syntono-lydian of Aristides the Enharmonic Tritê (_b*_) and the Nêtê (_e_) are wanting. But the Paramesê (_b_) is also wanting in both these modes. And the Ionian is open to the observation already made with regard to the Phrygian, viz. that the two highest notes (_c d_) involve a mixture of Diatonic with Enharmonic scale. We may add that Plutarch (who evidently wrote with Aristoxenus before him) gives no hint that the omission of these notes was characteristic of any particular modes.

6. It is impossible to decide the question of the modes of Aristides without some reference to another statement of the same author. In the chapter which treats of Intervals (pp. 13-15 Meib.) he gives the ancient division of two octaves, the first into dieses or quarter-tones, the second into semitones. The former of these ([Greek: hê para tois archaiois kata dieseis harmonia]) is as follows:

[1] 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12