MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS 



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of the Neolithic Age, which is very similar to those of the 

 savage tribes of Southern Asia and America. Balfour (The 

 Natural History of the Musical Bow, Oxford, 1899) sa y s tnat 

 the first stringed instrument must have belonged to the same 

 period as the clay drum, because the bow used in music was 

 developed from the bow used for shooting, and the first example 

 of the latter is found in neolithic settlements. 



Balfour distinguishes three stages of development : 

 (r) The bow used for shooting, which now among the 

 Kaffirs, Mandingos, Damaras, etc., in South Africa is oc- 

 casionally used as a musical instrument. 



FIG. 181. Pipe of reindeer 

 bone. 



FIG. 182. Clay drum from Ebendort, 

 near Magdeburg. 



(2) One-stringed bows solely made for musical purposes 

 (Zulus, Niam-Niam, Bongos, Basutos, Mashonas). 



(3) As an addition the bow has a resonator, usually a 

 hollow gourd, to improve the tone. This kind is the most 

 widely distributed. 



The bow, according to Balfour, was the true prototype of 

 stringed instruments in ancient Greece and Rome, in Northern 

 and Central India and in Central Brazil. If we imagine this 

 bow made rather more solidly and furnished with several 

 strings of various thickness, we have a harp in its simplest form. 



