Music of ancient Rome

"Roman music" redirects here. For music associated with the modern city of Rome, see Music of Rome.

Trio of musicians playing an aulos, cymbala, and tympanum (mosaic from Pompeii)

The music of ancient Rome was a part of Roman culture from earliest times.^[1] Music was customary at funerals, and the tibia (Greek aulos), a woodwind instrument, was played at sacrifices to ward off ill influences.^[2] Song (carmen) was an integral part of almost every social occasion.^[3] The Secular Ode of Horace, for instance, was commissioned by Augustus and performed by a mixed children's choir at the Secular Games in 17 BC. Under the influence of ancient Greek theory, music was thought to reflect the orderliness of the cosmos, and was associated particularly with mathematics and knowledge.^[4]

Etruscan music had an early influence on that of the Romans. During the Imperial period, Romans carried their music to the provinces, while traditions of Asia Minor, North Africa and Gaul became a part of Roman culture.^[5]

Music accompanied spectacles and events in the arena, and was part of the performing arts form called pantomimus, an early form of story ballet that combined expressive dancing, instrumental music and a sung libretto.^[6]

Musical notation

[[File:Musicians

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 timpani 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.
• Cymbala (Lat. plural of cymbalum, from the Greek kymbalon) were small cymbals: metal discs with concave centres and turned rims, used in pairs which were clashed together.^[7]

Masked theatrical troupe around an aulos player (mosaic from the House of the Tragic Poet, Pompeii)

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. Music was also used in religious ceremonies. The Romans cultivated music as a sign of education.^[8] 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.^[9]

Discography

• Synaulia, Music of Ancient Rome, Vol. I – Wind Instruments - Amiata Records ARNR 1396, Florence, 1996.
• Synaulia, Music of Ancient Rome, Vol. II – String Instruments - Amiata Records, ARNR 0302, Rome, 2002.
• Thaleia, Carmina Canere Music of Ancient Rome, Vol. I –Tarragona - Spain 2012.
• Ludi Scaenici, E Tempore Emergo - Rome, Italy - 2001
• Ludi Scaenici, Festina Lente - Rome, Italy - 2011
• Ensemble Kérylos, dir. Annie Bélis, De la pierre au son : musique de l'antiquité, K617, 1996.
• Ensemble Kérylos, dir. Annie Bélis, D'Euripide aux premiers chrétiens : musique de l'antiquité, 2016.

Notes

1st-century Roman wall painting of a harpist

1. ^ Naerebout, p. 146.
2. ^ Ginsberg-Klar, pp. 313, 316.
3. ^ Habinek, passim.
4. ^ Habinek, pp. 90ff.
5. ^ Scott, p. 404.
6. ^ Frankin, p. 95; Starks, pp. 14ff.
7. ^ Ulrich and Pisk, .
8. ^ Pierce, p. 45.
9. ^ Ginsberg-Klar, p. 313.
10. ^ Ulrich and Pisk, p. 25.
11. ^ Bonanni, plate 2.
12. ^ Ginsberg-Klar, p. 314.
13. ^ Bonanni, plate 3.
14. ^ Bonanni, unnumbered plate between plates 48 and 49, with commentary on the facing verso page.
15. ^ Ginsberg-Klar, p. 316.
16. ^ Williams, .
17. ^ Cook.
18. ^ Scott, p. 413.
19. ^ Walter, p. 23.
20. ^ Suetonius, cited in Scott, p. 418.
21. ^ Marcuse, pp. 137, 304.
22. ^ Scott, .
23. ^ Spring, p. 1.
24. ^ Higgins and Winnington-Ingram, pp. 62–71.

References

• Bonanni, Filippo. 1964. Antique Musical Instruments and their Players: 152 Plates from Bonanni's 18th-Century "Gabinetto armonico" , with a new introduction and captions by Frank Ll. Harrison and Joan Rimmer. New York: Dover Publications. Reprint of the 1723 work, Gabinetto armonico, with supplementary explanatory material.
• 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.)
• Cook, James H. 1999. "Organ History: Origin and Development through 800 AD". James H. Cook's Faculty Personal Website, at Birmingham-Southern College (Accessed 19 December 2012).
• Franklin, James L., Jr. 1987. "Pantomimists at Pompeii: Actius Anicetus and His Troupe". American Journal of Philology 108, no. 1:95-107
• Ginsberg-Klar, Maria E. 1981. "The Archaeology of Musical Instruments in Germany during the Roman Period". World Archaeology 12, no. 3:313-320
• Habinek, Thomas. 2005. The World of Roman Song. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Higgins, R. A., and Reginald P. Winnington-Ingram. 1965. "Lute-Players in Greek Art." Journal of Hellenic Studies 85:62–71.
• Marcuse, Sibyl. 1975. Musical Instruments: A Comprehensive Dictionary, corrected edition. The Norton Library. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. ISBN 0-393-00758-8.
• Naerebout, Frederick G. 2009. "Dance in the Roman Empire and Its Discontents". In Ritual Dynamics and Religious Change in the Roman Empire. Proceedings of the Eighth Workshop of the International Network Impact of Empire (Heidelberg, July 5–7, 2007): Brill.
• 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.
• Spring, Matthew. 2001. The Lute in Britain: A History of the Instrument and Its Music. Oxford University Press, 2001.
• Starks, John H., Jr., 2008. "Pantomime Actresses in Latin Inscriptions". In New Directions in Ancient Pantomime Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
• 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. Men and Music in Western Culture. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. ISBN 0-390-91600-5.
• Williams, C. F. Abdy. 1903. The Story of the Organ. London: Walter Scott Publishing Co.; New York: Charles Scribner & Sons.

Further reading

• Benzing, G. M. 2009. "'Se vuoi far soldi, studia la cetra': musica e luxus nell’antica Roma". In Luxus: Il piacere della vita nella Roma imperiale: [Torino, Museo di antichita, 26 settembre 2009 – 31 gennaio 2010], edited by Elena Fontanella, Rome: Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato. ISBN 9788824011631.
• Comotti, Giovanni. 1989. Music in Greek and Roman Culture, translated by Rosaria V. Munson. Ancient Society and History. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 0801833647 (cloth); ISBN 080184231X (pbk).
• Hagel, Stefan, and Christine Harrauer (eds.) (2005). Ancient Greek Music in Performance: Symposion Wien 29. Sept.–1. Okt. 2003. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. ISBN 3-7001-3475-4.
• Landels, J. G. 1999. Music in Ancient Greece & Rome. London and New York: Routledge.
• Maas, Martha. 2001. "Kithara". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers.
• West, M[artin] L[itchfield]. 1992. Ancient Greek Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-814897-6 (cloth) ISBN 0-19-814975-1 (pbk).
• Wille, Günther. 1967. Musica Romana: Die Bedeutung der Musik im Leben der Römer. Amsterdam: P. Schippers.

External links

• Ensemble Kérylos, a music group led by scholar Annie Bélis and dedicated to the recreation of ancient Greek and Roman music.
• 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
• Juvenal: Satire XI
• Ludi Scaenici Performance and research on the music and dance in the ancient Rome