1 - Music in Antiquity Flashcards
What is this instrument called?
bull lyre
What are four types of historical traces of music?
1) musical instruments
2) visual images or instruments and musicians
3) writings about music and musicians
4) music itself, preserved in notation or oral tradition
In the Stone Age, people bored finger holes in ______ ______ to make whistles and flutes.
animal bones
Metal bells, jingles, cymbals, rattles and horns appeared in the ______ Age.
Bronze
Plucked string instruments appeared in the ______ Age.
Bronze
What is the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers called?
Mesopotamia
Who developed the first true cities and civilizations?
the Sumerians
What system of writing was developed by the Sumerians?
cuneiform
Who is the earliest composer known to us by name?
Enheduanna
(2250 BC)
What civilization created the earliest known musical notation?
Babylonians
What were the three most important Greek musical instruments?
aulos, lyre, and kithara
What instrument is this woman playing?
aulos
What instrument is this?
aulos
The aulos was used in the worship of _________, god of fertility and wine.
Dinoysus
How many strings did the Greek lyre typically have?
seven
Greek lyres were strummed with a _________, or pick.
plectrum
What instrument is this?
Greek lyre
What was the Greek lyre’s soundbox typically made from?
a tortise shell over which oxhide was stretched
What was the larger Greek lyre called?
kithara
What Greek lyre was played while standing?
kithara
What instrument is this?
kithara
What is ethos?
one’s ethical character
What genera of tetrachord included two whole tones and a semitone?
(1, 1, .5)
diatonic
What intervals does an enharmonic tetrachord include?
one as large as two tones and two quarter tones
(2, .25, .25)
What were the two principle kinds of Greek writings on music?
- philosophical doctrines
- systematic descriptions of music (i.e. music theory)
Who was the founder of Greek music theory?
Pythagoras (d. ca. 500 B.C.)
Where does the word “music” come from?
From the Greek “mousike,” or “art of the Muses”
Greeks considered music an art, but also a science closely related to _____ and _____ .
arithmetic, astronomy
What was the texture of Greek music?
monophonic
What musical texture is characterized by the simultaneous variation of a single melodic line?
heterophony
What was ‘perfect melos’?
melody, text, and dance movement conceived as a whole
For the Greeks, what was music nearly synonymous with?
poetry
What is the unification of parts in an orderly whole?
harmonia
What is ethos?
one’s ethical character or way of being and behaving
Who asserted that music that imitated a certain ethos aroused the same ethos in the listener?
Aristotle
What two things did Plato and Aristotle feel education needed to include?
gymnastics for the body and music for the mind
What is the difference between continuous movement and diastematic movement?
In continuous movement, the voice glides up and down as in speech.
In diastematic (or intervalic) movement the voice moves between sustained pitches separeated by discrete intervals.
What is the definiton of a scale?
a series of three or more different pitches in ascending or descending order
What is a tetrachord?
Four notes spanning a perfect fourth
What were the three genera of tetrachords?
diatonic, chromatic, enharmonic
What genera of tetrachord included two whole tones and a semitone?
(1, 1, .5)
diatonic
What genera of tetrachord included a tone and a half and two semitones?
(1.5, .5, .5)
chromatic
What genera of tetrachord included an interval as large as two tones and two quarter tones?
(2, .25, .25)
enharmonic
Two successive tetrachords were __________ if they shared a note.
conjunct
Two successive tetrachords were __________ if they did not share a note.
disjunct
What were four tetrachords plus an added lowest note to complete a two-octave span called?
the Greater Perfect System
How many species are possible in the span of a fourth?
three
How many species are possible in the span of a fifth?
four
How many species are possible in the span of an octave?
seven
What defining aspect of later modes was missing from octave species?
a principle note on which a melody is expected to end
Who was Pythagoras (d. ca. 500 B.C.)?
the founder of Greek music theory
What is heterphony?
a musical texture characterized by the simultaneous variation of a single melodic line
What is harmonia?
the unification of parts in an orderly whole
What instrument was used for the worship of Dionysis?
the aulos
In a tetrachord, where are the larger intervals normally found?
at the top
In a tetrachord, where are the smaller intervals normally found?
at the bottom
What intervals does a diatonic tetrachord include?
two whole tones and a semitone
(1, 1, .5)
What intervals does a chromatic tetrachord include?
a tone and a half and two semitones
(1.5, .5, .5)
What intervals does an enharmonic tetrachord include?
one as large as two tones and two quarter tones
(2, .25, .25)
What is a species?
the particular ordering of whole tones and semitones within perfect fouths, fifths or octaves
In what time period did people bore finger holes in animal bones to make whistles and flutes?
the Stone Age
What are conjunct tetrachords?
Two successive tetrachords that share a note
What are disjunct tetrachords?
Two successive tetrachords that do not share a note
In what type of movement does the voice move between sustained pitches separated by discrete intervals?
diastematic (or intervalic) movement
What is the Greater Perfect System?
four tetrachords plus an added lowest note to complete a two-octave span
