when was the psaltery invented

[9] Evidence has been gathered also that with different names (such as salterio) it was played along with the flute early in the 20th century in small areas of High Aragon. Psalterion was a general word for harps in the latter part of the 4th Madrid, Prado, no. Its not possible to say whether double and triple strings were in unisons or octaves, but there is arguably a very strong indication in a later work. A fully chromatic psaltery is one way of interpreting the Memling instrument in the article above, which has 61 strings, possibly 5 chromatic octaves exactly, rather than your 62 strings, with an extra semitone. In the 19th century, several related zithers came into use, notably the guitar zither and the autoharp. London, Victoria & Albert Museum. In that year, Hermann Poll travelled from his home country of Germany to the University of Pavia, Italy, to study medicine. and directly from Latin psalterium "stringed instrument," from Greek psaltrion "stringed instrument," from psallein "play on a stringed instrument, pull, pluck" (see psalm ). In modern times, C + W players hold them against the chest. In most cases there are no existing examples of the actual instruments from the period, so detailed iconography yields invaluable information. : 8 Intriguing Early Musical Instruments, psaltery - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). The instruments name may have began in the Middle East, around the Mesopotamia area, where Iran and Iraq are This gives a single-strung range (counting from the left bridge) of 5 chromatic octaves exactly, and leaves the bottom 22 courses, doubled with shorter strings probably tuned a fifth or an octave above the fundamentals, selectively played or avoided according to where the player plucks along the string length. This psaltery has 61 strings, counting from the left bridge (more from the right bridge see below), positioned so closely together and so evenly that, if these were double or triple courses, it would be impossible to tell visually where one course ends and the next begins, but this cannot represent 61 independent diatonic pitches, as that would make a technically impossible range of 8 octaves and a sixth, so another tuning solution is necessary. The pitches for the first octave are as follows, with the shorter strings in square brackets: The next octave is similar, but not identical: We can see that, in order to retain the unbroken sequence of double course, double course, followed by shorter single course accidental, the two octaves follow a different sequence: the lower Bb is a long string but the higher bb is a short string. One thing you might have missed though is that the word psaltery isnt mediaeval in origin and doesnt come from the psalms specifically: the word psalterion/psalterium goes back to classical Greece and thence Rome, and was used in the Latin translation of the Bible (for example in Psalm 32 in the Vulgate=33 in English Bibles to refer to a ten-stringed instrument used to accompany sacred singing in the Old Testament). Top left to right: Three images of psalteries from the royally-appointed Iberian songbook, Cantigas de Santa Maria (Songs of Holy Mary), 1257-83, trapezoid, rectangular and pig-snout shaped. translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint where, in the Psalms, nebel was translated psalterion. In specific usage, this name denotes a form of long psaltery-styled instrument that is tuned to provide drone chords when drummed. Another is the harpsichord. History of the harpsichord If you search the internet for psaltery it is almost impossible to fight your way past the plethora of words and videos for the bowed psaltery. See more. The dulcimer/psalterion and the psaltery are similar in more than name: they share such a similar structure that it would be true to call a dulcimer a modified psaltery, to be played with small hammers of iron, or of brass, or such other material as may be preferred rather than quills, and usually with a central bridge or bridges to divide the vibrating length of each string, thus creating two or more different notes on one course. WebThe Bowed Psaltery that has arisen in popularity in its current form has little resemblance to the popular Psaltery of the ancient Middle East or the medieval instrument that grew in popularity throughout Europe from the 12th to the 15th Century. 1145-1155. After a single string at the top, possibly a bourdon, the double courses are in a group of two, then two, then three, then beyond this all double courses are more widely spaced. Like most other instruments of the time, the psaltery had no specific repertory, but was used to play whatever music the occasion demanded. Due to changing fashions and the limitations of a diatonic instrument in a new increasingly chromatic milieu, there is no renaissance music written specifically for the psaltery, and scant evidence of it being played after c. 1500. The remaining images are of the predominant pig-snout shape: top right, Portugal, 13th or 14th century; bottom row from left: France, c. 1418, from the crypt vault Saint-Bonnet-du-Gard; Spain, 1480s, detail from a triptych by Hans Memling; Germany, c. 1410, detail from the anonymous painting, Garden of Eden. Trapezoidal psaltery. Department of Music and Theatre A poem by Francesco da Barberino, Reggimento e costumi di donna (1318-1320) mentions a noblewoman dancing to a mezzo canone at an inn. Thats right, Julian. Paul Hillier, voice with Andrew Lawrence-King, harp and psaltery. It appears to be a psaltery with a keyboard, incompletely-drawn. musicinfo@iastate.edu, TheatreAdministrative Office: He doesnt mention which courses, but this does suggest a very different world of sound to that wed expect in 1635. F, or the strings to be held in place, traversing the bridges on both sides, a. psaltery needs tuning pins on one side and hitch pins on the other. The first is that Mersenne states that psalterion courses were strung double, either in unison or in octaves, and some courses with a third string at the fifth or fifteenth (double octave). translation of the Old Testament called theSeptuagintwhere, in the Psalms,nebelwas translatedpsalterion. My supposition is therefore that one of these string pairs are accidentals a semitone apart from the adjacent pair. 515-294-6409 fax Heres a link to a modern psaltery Im building: http://johnkorchok.com/blog/music/introducing-the-zhaltar/ The zither is essentially a psaltery, sometimes with strings in courses of two. It was referred to frequently in lists of musicians and instruments and in the art of the time. Cleveland Museum of Art. Its fully chromatic with a single string per note, strung with Nylgut and has a 62-note range (C2-C#7). If strung in 31 double courses, it would have a diatonic range of 4 octaves and a third, or less if there were both B and B, This may not have been the only solution. Appearing in Europe from the 11th century, the psalterys wire strings rang out in religious and secular contexts until around 1500, with a little evidence of a pocket of survival for a few decades after that. 1430). It was plucked with the fingers or quill plectra. The medieval qnn also diffused eastward across India to Indonesia and China. Part 2: Turning monophony into polyphony.). The pitches the Berkeley author gives for shorter strings are usually accidentals. Only the mid to low range can therefore have been in octaves. It is no coincidence, then, that since the maker was German, the earliest extant image is, too. It may be that this was the original form of the psalterion or hammer dulcimer, essentially a hammered psaltery, with central bridges added later. Historically, wire strings were made of brass, iron, silver or gold. If we allow for double-stringing of courses, this gives 30 pitches plus 1 single string, a diatonic range of 4 octaves and a third or less if, as happened on some diatonic harps, there was both a B and a B, To summarise. (Angelus Ad Virginem we have, The Kings Note is sadly lost.). Chord zithers retain the late Medieval stringing of B and Bb, otherwise diatonic. I know because I have both. I think I was probably splitting hairs! We have seen the evolution from the diatonic psaltery to the addition of accidentals by additional courses, or by fretting, or by fully chromatic stringing probably shown by Memling, making it essentially a plucked harpsichord. Thank you for this detailed work. Ian. It may be that if one learns to hold and balance the instrument from the beginning then the practicalities of standing and playing, supporting the psaltery only with the arms, are unproblematic, but the iconography suggests otherwise, often showing impossibly suspended instruments with no means of support. lower-pitched courses, perhaps indicative of some accidentals, as in the Berkeley manuscript. I dont really know about the history of the autoharp, but the same principle of strings across a frame played on the lap facing forward does suggest an organological link. Bowed psaltery HISTORY OF THE PLUCKED PSALTERY The strings of the medieval instrument were usually made of metal, unlike the finger-plucked harp, strung with catgut, and played using a plectrum or pick. The harp is strung with a single string for each tone, open to be plucked from either side of the instrument; a psaltery may have multiple strings for each tone, strung across a soundboard. By the time of the beautifully illuminated Cantigas de Santa Maria (Songs of Holy Mary), an Iberian royal songbook of circa 1257-83, various shapes and sizes of psaltery were in evidence rectangular, trapezoid, and pig snout shaped. In his Harmonie universelle, 1635, French Jesuit priest and music theorist Marin Mersenne wrote about the psalterion. So this leads us to the possibility of believing Memlings literal representation of the stringing: the reason it is not possible to tell where one putative double or triple course ends and the next begins is because it is strung singly, until we reach the lowest 22 courses. WebThe illumination MS.37-1950.f.2r, comes from a late fifteenth-century Italian psalter made for a member of the Medici family of Florence. The English verses from the original German are by Ian Pittaway. All the best. The word is from the Old English psealm or salm and Old French psaume or saume, derived from Church Latin psalmus, which itself comes ultimately from the Greek psalmos, a song sung to a harp, and psallein, to pluck on a stringed instrument. The name salterio or psalterium for the instrument comes from the Yebra, Spain. 1377-1392, illustrated a psaltery which is triple-strung, throughout being played, apparently, with, The evidence is circumstantial but, I would argue, strong. So swetely that all the chambre rong; Musician Ccile Nuez plays Tambourin de Barn and one-handed flute (flabuta) in, "Some notes on the Pyrenean Stringed Drum with five musical examples", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, "The Stringed Drum and the 16th Century Music: New Iconographical Sources", https://doi.org/10.3989/anuariomusical.2011.66.122, "Mixel ETXEKOPAR & Franois ROSS Une certaine Soule musique", "Instruments de la Msica Tradicional Basca", "Flutes et Tambourin de Cordes, Flabutas et Tamborin". ), The Berkeley psaltery illustration (right) and its commentary gives a range of an octave and a major third, A to c. no indication of either unison or octave stringing, and the shorter courses are single-strung. There are, however, two intriguing late depictions indicating renaissance development of the psaltery in its final days. I am now in the process of correcting that in the main text. In 1700, Cristofori invented what he called un cimbalo di cipresso di piano e forte, a keyboard of cypress with soft and loud. The Millers Tale in Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales, written at the end of the 14th century, not only mentions the psaltery but also names two tunes, Angelus Ad Virginem and The Kings Note, that were played on it. Hans Memling (or Memlinc) was a 15th century German painter who worked in Flanders and bequeathed to us fine representations of musical instruments. The skeletal player in the Heidelberger Totentanz, a German book of 38 woodcut prints of the dance of death, published in 1488, is one of only a handful of images to show a strap. The tuning is often held in root, tonic and dominant, or root and fifth. The fingerholes on the shawms on our right, for example, are in places that would render them unplayable. 18th century Spanish psaltery. Within each gap is drawn a shorter single string coming from the right. A painting by Venetian artist Girolamo da Santacroce in the first half of the 16, King David playing the psaltery, painted in the first half of the. TUTORIALS CONTACT US SHOPPING CART A HISTORY OF THE PLUCKED PSALTERY The psaltery is a type of medieval zither. I was looking to see if the internet had any pictures showing her so engaged, though I couldnt find one. Berkeley author gives for shorter strings are usually accidentals. Trapezoidal psaltery. The kantele is a beautiful instrument, played in Finland (kantele or kannel), Karelia (kantele or kandele), Lithuania (kankle), Estonia (kannel), and Latvia (kokle or kuokle). [citation needed]. Its name probably originates in religious use, as an accompaniment to singing songs from the psalms, known as psalmody and sung from a psalter, thus the psaltery. Psaltery Updates? German nativity carol which accumulated verses through the late medieval, renaissance and early baroque periods. 1440. Since we cannot know the comparative gauges of the strings, it may be that the shorter strings were tuned in octaves to the longer adjacent strings, so the same principle could apply to playing or avoiding octaves. Apart from the borrowed name, it is unrelated to the medieval psaltery. click on image for psaltery sound (140kb wav) Its possible to see these early harpsichord forms as descendants of the qanun psaltery. I suspect the short blocks of wood are for fretting notes sharp, for pressing onto the strings to give all the correct notes for sharps. [1] 1440. If Mersennes psalterion stringing practice was derived from the psaltery then where there was triple stringing on lower courses it is possible that there was an octave added to an octave the Octave and at the fifteenth to augment the harmony or possibly the fundamental, the fifth and the octave, the Octave, to which one could add others at the fifth.. The psaltery first appeared in Europe in the 11, Its not possible to say whether double and triple strings were in unisons or octaves, but there is arguably a very strong indication in a later work. We have no precise details for which courses were in octaves, double octaves, fifths and unisons, but technical necessity yields some of the information. The word psalm is of course related; they both derive from the Greek word psallein meaning originally to pluck, and later to sing to a plucked instrument. this figure [above] represents that which is used now, on which are put thirteen sets of strings, of which each has two strings at the unison or at the Octave, to which one could add others at the fifth, and at the fifteenth to augment the harmony. Could the unison, octave and double-octave psalterion stringing be a continuance of earlier medieval psaltery practice? I think you might have distinguished between the canon and micanon (half canon) and the psaltery this instrument was a borrowing from the Arabic qanun and appears in lists with psalteries, meaning that it was regarded as a distinct instrument. By attaching hammers instead of quills to the keys a return to the principle of the psalterion/dulcimer, but now mechanised he had invented an instrument with a wide gradation of dynamic range, giving the player control over volume not possible in the harpsichord family. [2] From the 1970s on, the instrument has shown renewed vitality.

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