The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-06-22
HISTORY OF MUSIC.
ETHIOPIAN & HEBREW.
Morris Steinert'8 Fourth Tn tere8ting Article on
 the Subject.
ARTICLE "

tan music. There were other contem- poraneous nations such as the natives or Western Asia Minor, the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris and the coun- tres between the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf. These were the Assyri- ans, Babylonians, Phoenicians, Ly- dlans, Phrygians, Medes and Perslans. These nations differed greatly from the Egyptlans in their conceptions of mu- SIC Assyrla was more of an autocratic Kingdom than Egypt It's reigning des- pots were bold conquerors such as Minus, Salmanassar or such vol1ptua- ries as Sardanapalus or Semiramis who was considered an art loving queen. Music never attained higher purpose than to praise the ruling monarch, their earthly god, or to pander to his tastes. The musicians position never rose above that of an ordinary subject whose life depended upon the capri cious whim of the tyrant.
 The Assyrian instruments consisted of some portable triangular harps play ed with a plectrum, drums, double flutes called the Kinoor and was played with a plectrun. The Dulcimer consist ed of a square resonance box with strings affixed to the top. The strings of the Dulcimer were struck with some sort of hammer that is considered precursor of our piano hammer in the present pfanoforte. The women and children used to accompany their sing ing with rhythmical clapping of hands like the Egyptians and Philippians.
 The Chaldeans and Babylonians had two peculiar instruments, Sambuka and Symphoneia. The latter was con- sidered the ancestor of our bagpipe.
 The Chaldeans, who were probably the oldest astronomers, connected mu- sic with the movements of the heaven ly bodies similar to the Chinese, Hin docs and Egyptians. They associated music with the seasons. symbolizing the relation of spring to autumn by the interval of a fourth, and of spring to winter and summer by the intervals of fifth and octave.
 The Medes and Persians had similar instruments and methods of producing music like the Assyrians and Baby ionians. When Parmenio, general of Alexander the Great conquered the Darians, there were found among the prisoners no less than 329 singers and dancers who belonged at the same time to the harem of the king.
 The music of the Phoenicians ap- pears to have exercised a most excit- ing and intoxicating Influence over the passions. Nor is it to be wondered at when we consider that music accom- panied the performance of the inde- corus ceremonies of Astarte, the Phoenician Ahprodite. The men and women that took part in the process slcns in honor of this goddess wander ed through the streets of the great seaport towns amidst the maddening sounds of flies, double-fiutes, cyrnbals, drums and clappers, the ceaseless din of the instruments stimulating their depraved fanaticism to such a pitch that they scourged themselves even to bleeding, or mutilated themselves with swords.
 The harp lost its old musical import ance and dignity with the Phoenicians, and became the favorite instrument fo the Hetaerae. Naturally this observa- tion does not refer to the large priest harp, but only to the small portable harp introduced from Egypt. It Is in reference to this, and to the hands into which the instrument had fallen, that the prophet Isaiah, addressing the city of Tyre, says; "After the end of sev- entry years shall Tyre sing as an har- lot. Take a harp, go about the city, thou harlot that hast been forgotten make sweet melody, sing many songs, that thou mayest be remembered" Qs- aiah xiii 15. 16)
 Though the tonal art was subjected to base uses by the Phoenicians it is a strange phenomena that the elegy which was composed in honor of the death of the youthful Adonis was as cribed to them. That this elegy had it's origin among the Phoenicfans who were considered a degenerate nation compos- ed of licentious and dissolute individ- uals is possible for such people may, after all, have instilled into their minds the realization of the hollowness of dissipation and the vanity of earthly things.
 The Phrygians and Lydians indulged in musical compositions for the flute of aa effeminate and enervating character which adapted it especially for the worship of Adonis. The relation of music to religion must have been slight amongst these people who were pos- sessed of warlike and effeminate quail tiles in about an equal measure and they appear to have given way to lux urious revelry. Their religious music was superficial in contrast to that of the Egyptians and Hindoos with whom 1t was profound and mysterious.
 Mention must now be made of the Ethiopians, the nearest neighbors of the Egyptians, as 1t is historically af- frmed that the latter migrated from Ethiopia. In the music of the Ethiopi- ans evidence is offered in support of these charges. They have a number of instruments in common with the Egyp- tians such as the Sistrum, the Egyp- tan Tyre and small drum. The Ethiopi- ans attribute to the Egyptian god, Thot, the introduction of this drum in- to their land in the first year of the creation of the world but it is more probable that this drum was transmit ted from the Philippians to the Egyp- tians. The clapping of hands common to Egyptian women and maidens for marking the rhythm of their songs is also to be found in Ethiopia. In fact, some songs sung in Ethiopia up to this day bear similarity to a great number