Lyre with four strings, from a Lycian coin. (Cabinet of Sir Charles Fellows.)
Lyre with seven strings, from a coin of Chalcis. (British Museum.)
LỸRA (λύρα, Lat. fides), a lyre, one of the most ancient musical instruments of the stringed kind. The Greeks attributed the invention of the lyre to Hermes, who is said to have formed the instrument of a tortoise-shell, over which he placed gut-strings. The name λύρα, however, does not occur in the Homeric poems, and the ancient lyre, called in Homer phorminx (φόρμιγξ) and citharis (κίθαρις), seems rather to have resembled the cithara of later times, which was in some respects like a modern guitar. In the cithara the strings were drawn across the bottom, whereas in the lyra of ancient times they were free on both sides. The lyre is also called χέλυς or χελώνη, and in Latin testudo, because it was made of a tortoise-shell. The lyre had originally three or four strings, but after the time of Terpander of Antissa (about B.C. 650), who is said to have added three more, it was generally made with seven. The ancients, however, made use of a variety of lyres; and about the time of Sappho and Anacreon several stringed instruments, such as magadis, barbiton, and others, were used in Greece, and especially in Lesbos. They had been introduced from Asia Minor, and their number of strings far exceeded that of the lyre, for we know that some had even twenty strings, so that they must have more resembled a modern harp than a lyre. But the lyra and cithara had in most cases no more than seven strings. The lyre had a great and full-sounding bottom, which continued as before to be made generally of tortoise-shell, from which the horns rose as from the head of a stag. A transverse piece of wood connecting the two horns at or near their top-ends served to fasten the strings, and was called ζύγον, and in Latin transtillum. The horns were called πήχεις or cornua. These instruments were often adorned in the most costly manner with gold and ivory. The lyre was considered as a more manly instrument than the cithara, which, on account of its smaller-sounding bottom, excluded full-sounding and deep tones, and was more calculated for the middle tones. The lyre when played stood in an upright position between the knees, while the cithara stood upon the knees of the player. Both instruments were held with the left hand, and played with the right. It has generally been supposed that the strings of these instruments were always touched with a little staff called plectrum (πλῆκτρον), but among the paintings discovered at Herculaneum we find several instances where the persons play the lyre with their fingers. The lyre was at all times only played as an accompaniment to songs. The Latin name fides, which was used for a lyre as well as a cithara, is probably the same as the Greek σφίδες, which signifies gut-string. The lyre (cithara or phorminx) was at first used in the recitations of epic poetry, though it was probably not played during the recitation itself, but only as a prelude before the minstrel commenced his story, and in the intervals or pauses between the several parts. The lyre has given its name to a species of poetry called lyric; this kind of poetry was originally never recited or sung without the accompaniment of the lyre, and sometimes also of an appropriate dance.
Anacreon playing the lyre. (Vase-painting in the British Museum.)
M
MAENIĀNUM, signified, originally, a projecting balcony, which was erected round the Roman forum, by the censor, C. Maenius, B.C. 318, in order to give more accommodation to the spectators of the gladiatorial combats. Hence balconies in general came to be called maeniana.
MĂGĂDIS. [[Lyra].]
MĂGISTER., which contains the same root as mag-is and mag-nus, was applied at Rome to persons possessing various kinds of offices, and especially to the leading person in a collegium or corporation [[Collegium]]; thus the magister societatis was the president of the corporation of equites, who farmed the taxes at Rome.