The horn must have been well known at this time in England, for there are 17th-century horns of English manufacture still extant, one, for instance, in the collection of the Rev. F. W. Galpin by William Bull, dated 1699.[52] In 1701 Clagget[53] invented a contrivance by means of which two horns in different keys could be coupled and played by means of one mouthpiece, a valve or key opening the passage into the airways of one or the other of these horns at the will of the performer. Another horn of English manufacture about 1700 was exhibited at the South Kensington Museum in 1872, bearing No. 337 in the catalogue, in which unfortunately no details are given. Enough examples have been quoted to show that, judging from the specimens extant, Germany was not behind France, if not actually ahead, in the manufacture of early natural horns. Data are wanting concerning the instruments of Italy; they would probably prove to be the earliest of all, and as brass wind instruments are perishable are perhaps for that very reason unrepresented at the present day.
The horn at the present stage in its evolution was also well represented among the illustrations of the musical literature in Germany[54] during the first half of the 18th century, and references to it are frequent.
The earliest orchestral music for the horn occurs in the operas of Cavalli and Cesti, leaders of the Venetian Opera in the 17th century. Already in 1639 Cavalli in his opera Le Nozze de Tito e Pelei (act i. sc. 1) introduced a short scena, Music. “Chiamata alla Caccia”[55] in C major for four horns on a basso continuo. An examination of the scoring in C clefs on the first, second, third and fourth lines shows, by the use of the note
in the bass part and in the second tenor of
the 5th harmonic of the series, that the fundamental could have been no other than the 16-ft. C; the highest note in the treble part is
, the 12th harmonic of the 8-ft. alto horn in C, now obsolete. It is clear therefore that horns with tubing respectively 8 ft. and 16 ft. long, which must have been disposed in coils as in the present day, were in use in Italy before the middle of the 17th century, fifty years before the date of their reputed invention in Paris.
In the same opera, act i. sc. 4, “Coro di Cavalieri” is a stirring call to arms of elemental grandeur, in which occur the words: “all’ armi, ò la guerrieri corni e tamburi e trombe, ogni campo ogni canto, armi rimbombe.” There are above the voice parts four staves with treble and C clef signatures above the bass, and, although no instruments are indicated, the music written thereon, which alternates with the voices but does not accompany them, can have been intended for no instruments but trumpets and horns, thus carrying out the indications in the text. The horn is here once again put to the same use as the Roman cornu, and associated in like manner with the descendant of the buccina in a call to arms. It may be purely a coincidence that the early illustration of a horn with the tubing wound in coils round the body in the Strassburg Virgil mentioned above was put to the same use and associated with the same instrument.