Fig. 3.—Bronze and Reed Flutes. Ancient Egyptian.
B.C. 600 or later.
British Museum.
The sebȧ, a single flute, was of considerable length, and the performer appears to have been obliged to extend his arms almost at full length in order to reach the furthest finger-hole. As sebȧ is also the name of the leg-bone (like the Latin tibia) it may be supposed that the Egyptian flute was originally made of bone. Those, however, which have been found are of wood or reed.
A flute-concert is painted on one of the tombs in the pyramids of Gizeh and dates, according to Lepsius, from an age earlier than B.C. 2000. Eight musicians are performing on flutes. Three of them, one behind the other, are kneeling and holding their flutes in exactly the same manner. Facing these are three others, in a precisely similar position. A seventh is sitting on the ground to the left of the six, with his back turned towards them, but also in the act of blowing his flute, like the others. An eighth is standing at the right side of the group with his face turned towards them, holding his flute before him with both hands, as if he were going to put it to his mouth, or had just left off playing. He is clothed, while the others have only a narrow girdle round their loins. Perhaps he is the director of this singular band, or the solo performer who is waiting for the termination of the tutti before renewing his part of the performance. The division of the players into two sets, facing each other, suggests the possibility that the instruments were classed somewhat like the first and second violins, or the flauto primo and flauto secondo of our orchestras. The occasional employment of the interval of the third, or the fifth, as accompaniment to the melody, is not unusual even with nations less advanced in music than were the ancient Egyptians.
The Double-Pipe, called mam, appears to have been a very popular instrument, if we judge from the frequency of its occurrence in the representations of musical performances. Furthermore, the Egyptians had, as far as is known to us,
two kinds of trumpets; three kinds of tambourines, or little hand drums; three kinds of drums, chiefly barrel-shaped; and various kinds of gongs, bells, cymbals, and castanets. The trumpet appears to have been usually of brass. A peculiar wind-instrument, somewhat the shape of a champagne bottle and perhaps made of pottery or wood, also occurs in the representations transmitted to us.
The Egyptian drum was from two to three feet in length, covered with parchment at both ends and braced by cords. The performer carried it before him, generally by means of a band over his shoulder, while he was heating it with his hands on both ends. Of another kind of drum an actual specimen has been found in the excavations made in the year 1823 at Thebes. It was 1½ feet high and 2 feet broad, and had cords for bracing it. A piece of catgut encircled each end of the drum, being wound round each cord, by means of which the cords could be tightened or slackened at pleasure by pushing the two hands of catgut towards or from each other. It was beaten with two drumsticks slightly bent. The Egyptians had also straight drumsticks with a handle, and a knob at the end. The Berlin museum possesses some of these. The third kind of drum was almost identical with the darabuka of the modern Egyptians. The Tambourine was either round, like that which is at the present time in use in Europe as well as in the east; or it was of an oblong square shape, slightly incurved on the four sides.
