1874.] Notices of Books. 517 
the earlier Middle Ages, and till the time of Guido d’Arezzo, in 
the eleventh century. 
The Greeks acquired their music from the Egyptians; 
Renaissant Europe acquired its music from Greek sources. 
““No Roman of antiquity,” says Mr. Chappell, “is known to 
have made, or even to have attempted, any improvement in the 
science of music. The Romans received the diatonic scale, of 
tones and semitones, from the Greeks, at a time when it existed 
only in its primitive and imperfect form. Nevertheless they 
were content to retain it so, and did not follow the Greeks in 
any subsequent imprevement. It is for that reason Greek music 
cannot be effectually learnt from Roman writers.” In the fourth 
century the practice of singing alternate verses of psalms by a 
choir was introduced from Antioch, and this was called anti- 
phonal. ‘The introduction of Greek words in ecclesiastical 
music was another cause of confusion in the study of Greek 
music; for the meaning of anti, as applied to Greek music, is 
in the sense of with or accompanying, not against, and Greek 
antiphons were harmonious and concordant sounds, an octave 
apart. Again, according to Mr. Chappell, the Greek Harmonia 
means a ‘“‘system of music,” or simply ‘‘music,” and has 
nothing to do with the modern word ‘‘harmony,” either in its 
English, French, German, or Spanish sense. Also, the Greek 
Melodia does not mean melody according to our sense of the 
word. ‘Greek Melos had not necessarily any tune in it. It 
applied to the rising and falling sounds of the voice when linked 
together in speech, or in rhythm, as well as in music; so that 
recitation, without any musical intervals in it, would still be 
melodia. Thirdly, Harmonike does not mean harmonic or 
harmonics, but is a synonyme for harmonia. Again, Sumphonia 
does not mean ‘symphony.’ The last expresses our ‘harmony,’ 
viz., concords of notes of different pitch.” No wonder that 
Greek music has puzzled so many modern writers ; no wonder 
Dr. Burney calls it ‘‘a dark and difficult subject, which has 
foiled the most learned men of the two or three last centuries.” 
Our present musical scale is founded upon that of the Greeks; 
it is simply a re-adjustment of the Pythagorean scale, made in 
the second century a.p., by Claudius Ptolemy, the mathema- 
tician. The Greeks trace the origin of their music to Hermes, 
who invented the lyre. The old Homeric lyre was an instrument 
of four strings, and several accounts are given of its invention 
by Apollodorus, Diodorus Siculus, and others. According to a 
hymn to Hermes, of considerable antiquity, the god ‘‘ found a 
mountain tortoise grazing near his grotto on Mount Kyllene. 
He disembowelled it, took its shell, and out of the back of the 
shell he formed the lyre. He cut two stalks of reed of equal 
length, and, boring the shell, he employed them as arms or sides 
to the lyre. He stretched the skin of an ox over the shell. It 
was perhaps the inner skin, to cover the open part, and thus to 
VOL. IV. (N.S.) 3U 
