Fig. 253. Lyre.
As the school scene shows, flute-playing, though condemned by Plato and Aristotle,[96] was commonly taught at Athens. Ancient flutes are distinguished from the modern instruments by the vibrating reed which formed the mouthpiece, and by the fact that they were always played in pairs. Hence the frequency with which pairs of ancient flutes are found. Two of sycamore wood (No. 645; Case 56) were discovered in the same tomb (near Athens) as the lyre described above (No. 642). Another pair of flutes (in bronze) from Italy (No. 646; fig. 254) have their mouthpieces in the form of busts of Maenads. A terracotta shows a pair of female musicians (No. 647) playing with a drum and double flutes. To assist the playing of the two flutes together a mouth-band was often worn, as may be seen from designs on vases, e.g., on a cup of Epiktetos (E 38; Third Vase Room), and on some of the Cypriote sculptures in the Gold Ornament Room passage.
A framed impression from a Greek hymn to Apollo inscribed on stone is here exhibited (No. 648). Musical notes, indicated by letters of the Greek alphabet in various positions, are placed at intervals over the letters to guide the singer. The inscription was found at Delphi, where other inscriptions of a similar character have come to light.
Flute-playing was very popular with the Romans, among whom it was considered the proper accompaniment of every kind of ceremony.[97] For military purposes they used several other wind instruments. Two bronze mouthpieces (No. 649) in Case 55 may perhaps come from long straight trumpets (tubae). The Roman curved horn (cornu) is represented by two large specimens in bronze (No. 650) placed at the top of Cases 55, 56. The terracotta bugle in Case 55 is probably a model of the Roman bucina (No. 651).
Fig. 254.—Bronze Flutes and Cymbals (Nos. 646, 654). 1:3.
The simplest of all ancient wind instruments is the rustic Pan's pipe (syrinx), usually formed of seven or eight hollow reeds fastened together with wax. The Greek Pan's pipe has the reeds of equal length, the different notes being produced by the different positions of the natural joints of the reed. An example may be seen among the Cypriote sculptures in the Gold Ornament Room passage. The Roman syrinx had its lower edge sloping, the result of cutting off the reeds immediately below the natural joints. A terracotta statuette in Case 55 (No. 652) represents a shepherd boy playing on a Pan's pipe of the Roman kind, and a marble relief from Ephesus at the top of Case 54 (No. 653) shows a beardless man seated with a large syrinx in his hands. The Greek inscription tells us that the relief was dedicated by Ebenos, a "first flute," to Hierokles his piper.
It was the Pan's pipe which gave Ktesibios of Alexandria (third century B.C.; cf. p. 120) the model on which he constructed his water-organ, an instrument which became popular with the Romans. A Roman "contorniate" shown in Case 58 has one of these water-organs represented upon it. The air was supplied by water pressure and the notes were played by means of a key-board.