840 L Y 
over the (boulder, like our fmaller harp or guitar, or like 
,-tlie ancient lyres reprefented in fculpture. 
Tacitus, Arinal. xvi. 4. among the rules of decorum 
obferved by public performers, to which Nero, he fays, 
ftriclly fubmitted, mentions, “ That he was not to iit 
down when tired.” It is remarkable that he calls thefe 
rules , Cithares Leges, “The Laws of the Cithara;” which 
feems to afford a pretty fair proof of its being of fuch a 
iize and form as to admit of being played on finding. 
The belly of a theorbo, or arch-lute, is ufually made in 
the (hell-form, as if the idea of its origin had never been 
loft; and the etymology of the word guitar feems natu¬ 
rally deducible from cithara ; it is fuppofed that the Ro¬ 
man C was hard, like the Greek K; and the Italian 
word ckitarra is manifeflly derived from 
Thefe paffages in old authors are a kind of antique 
drawings, far more fatisfaflory than thofe of ancient 
fculpture ; for we have feen the fyrinx, which had a re¬ 
gular feries’of notes afcending or defcending, reprefented 
•with feven pipes, four of one length, and three of another, 
•which of courfe would furnifli no more than two different 
.founds. The cymbals too, which were to be flruck again ft 
each other, are placed in the hands of fome antique figures 
in fuch a manner, that it is impoflible to bring them in 
contafl with the neceflary degree of force, without am¬ 
putating, or atjeaft violently bruifing, the thumbs of the 
performer. And it is certain that artifts continue to figure 
-inftruments in the moft fimple and convenient form for 
their defigns, long after they had been enlarged, improved, 
and rendered more complicated. An inftan.ce of this in 
our own country will confirm the affertion. In the reign 
of George II. a marble ftatue was erefted to Handel, in 
Vauxhall gardens. The mufician is reprefented playing 
.upon a lyre. Now, if this ftatue fliould be preferved from 
the ravages of time and accident 12 or 1400 years, the 
antiquaries will naturally conclude that the inftrument 
upon which Handel acquired his reputation was the lyre; 
though we are at prefent certain that he never played on, 
or even faw, a lyre, except in wood or ftone. 
In one of the ancient paintings at Portici, there is a 
lyre with a pipe or flute for the crofs bar, or bridge at 
the top. Whether this tube was ufed as a flute to ac¬ 
company the lyre, or only a pitch-pipe, we know not; 
nor in the courfe of our enquiries has any fimilar example 
of fuch a junction occurred elfewhere. 
Broffard feems to have abridged the hiftory and pro- 
.grefs of the lyre chronologically in the moft lliort and 
clear manner, which Graffmeau has fpun out to great 
.length by jumping from one century to another, and 
.crowding together all the wild and incoherent ftories re¬ 
lative to the lyre, its inventors and performers, that he 
could find. All that the diligent and generally-accurate 
.Broffard fays on the fubjefl is, that the lyre was a ftringed 
inftrument, upon which the whole mufical fyftem of the 
ancients has been built. It is pretended that Mercury 
firft invented it by chance, and that it had then only- 
three firings, which confifted of BCD; that Apollo added 
■a fourth, Chorebus a fifth, Hyagnis a fixtb, and Terpan- 
der a feventh. It remained in this Hate till the time 
of Pythagoras; or, according to others, Lycaon added to 
it an eighth firing, to render the extremities confonant. 
Timotheus afterwards added a ninth, tenth, and eleventh, 
firing. Others after him increafed the number to fixteen, 
that is, fifteen principals, and one added. 
Mr. Barnes, in the prolegomena to his edition of Ana¬ 
creon, has an enquiry into the antiquity and ftrufture of 
the lyre; of which he makes Jubal the firft inventor. For 
Ihe feveral changes this inftrument underwent, by the ad¬ 
dition of new firings, he obferves, that, according to Dio¬ 
dorus, it had originally only three, referring to the three 
ieafons of the year, as the Greeks counted them, viz. fpring, 
fumrner, and autumn ; whence it was called rfi^op^o;. 
Afterwards it had feven firings ; as appears from Homer, 
Pindar, H6race, Virgil, &c. Feftus Avienus gives the 
lyre of Orpheus nine firings. David mentions an injlru- 
a 
E E. • ( 7 .i 
went with ten firings. Timotheus of Miletus added four 
to the old feven, which made eleven. Jofephus.in his 
Jewifh Antiquities, makes mention of one with' twelve 
ftrings; to which were afterwards added fix others, which 
made eighteen in all. Anacreon himfelf fays, of 
Mr. Barnes’s edition, canto vighui lath c/iordis. As for the 
modern lyre, or Welfn harp, it is fufficiently known. 
From the lyre, which.ail-.agree to be the firft inftrument 
of the ftringed kindin Greece, there arofe an infinite num¬ 
ber of others, different in fhape and number of firings; 
as the pfalterium, tifigon, fambucus, pedtis, magadis, bar- 
biton, teftudo, (the two laft ufed promifcuoufiy, by Ho¬ 
race; with the lyre and cithara,) epigonium, fimmicium, 
and pand-ura; which were ail (truck with the hand, or a 
pleftrum. The different claimants among the Greeks to 
the fame mufical difcoveries, only prove that mufic was cul¬ 
tivated in different countries, and that the inhabitants of 
each country invented and improved their own inftruments, 
fome of which happening to referable thofe of other parts 
of Greece, rendered it difficult for hiftorians to avoid at¬ 
tributing the fame invention to different perfons. Thus 
the (ingle flute was given to Minerva and to Marfyas; the 
fyrinx or fift-ula, to Pan an(Lt° Cybele ; and the lyre or ci¬ 
thara, to Mercury, Apollo, Amphion, Linus, and Orpheus. 
Indeed, the mere addition of a firing or two to, an inftru¬ 
ment without a neck, was fo obvious and eafy, that it is 
fcarcely pofflble not to conceive many people to have done 
it at the fame time. With refpecft to the form of the 
ancient lyre, as little agreement is.to be found among au¬ 
thors as about the number of firings. Some reprefenta- 
tions of that inftrument in the hands ,of ancient ftatues, 
bas-reliefs, &c. we (hall give under the article Music, ta 
which the reader is referred for further particulars. 
The Aby-ftinian teftudo, or lyre in ufe at prefent in the 
province of Tigre, fays Mr. Bruce, “has fometimes five. 
Sometimes fix, but moft frequently feven, ftrings, made of 
the thongs of raw fheep or goat fkins, cut extremely fine, 
and twilled; they rot foon, are very fubjecl to break in 
dry weather, and have fcarcely any found in wet. From 
the idea, however, of this inftrument being to accompany 
and fuftain a voice, one would think that it was better 
mounted formerly. The Abyflinians have a tradition, 
that the fiftrum, lyre, and tambourine, were brought from 
Egypt into Ethiopia, by Thot, in the very firft ages of the 
world. The flute, kettle-drum, and trumpet, they fay, were 
brought from Paleftine, with Menelek, fon of their queen 
of Saba by Solomon, who was their firft jewilh king. The 
lyre in Amharic is called beg, the fheep ; in Ethiopic it 
is called mefinko ; the verb finko fignifies to ftrike ftrings 
with the fingers; no plectrum is ever ufed in Abyffinia; 
fo that nejinko, being literally interpreted, will fignify the 
‘ ftringed inftrument played upon with the fingers.’ The 
fides which conflitute the frame of the lyre were anciently 
compofed of the horns of an animal of the goat kind, called 
agazen, about the fize of a frnall cow, and common in the 
province of Tigre. I have feen feveral of thefe inftruments 
very elegantly made of fuch horns, which nature feems to 
have fhaped on purpofe. Some of the horns of an African 
fpecies of this animal may be feen in M. Buffon’s hiftory 
of the king of France’s cabinet. They are bent, and lels 
regular than the Abyflinian; but after fire-arms became 
common in the province of Tigre, and the woods were 
cut down, this animal being more fcarce, the lyre has been 
made of a light red wood; however, it is always cut into 
a fpiral twifted form, in imitation of the ancient materials 
of which the lyre was compofed. The kingdom of Tigre, 
which is the largeft and moft populous province of Abyf¬ 
finia, and was during many ages the feat of the court, was 
the firft which received letters, and civil religious govern¬ 
ment; it extended once to the Red Sea; various reafons 
and revolutions have obliged the inhabitants to refign their 
fea-coaft to different barbarous nations, Pagan and Maho¬ 
metan ; while they were poffefled of it, they fay that the 
Red Sea furnifhed them with tortoife-fhells, of which 
they made the bellies of their lyres, as she Egyp¬ 
tians 
