Pythagoras is said to have invented the lyre. Our own poet Longfellow, in “Verses to a Child,” thus relates the story:
“As great Pythagoras of yore,
Standing beside the blacksmith’s door,
And hearing the hammers as they smote
The anvils with a different note,
Stole from the varying tones that hung
Vibrant on every iron tongue,
The secret of the sounding wire,
And formed the seven-chorded lyre.”
See also the same poet’s “Occultation of Orion”—