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- Title
HARFE UND HARFENSPIEL BEI DEN RÖMERN.
- Authors
NAJOCK, DIETMAR
- Abstract
In classical antiquity, harps were always played with the soundbox held upright, but in the MA, as today, only the contrary position can be observed. As a possible solution of this transitionproblem, I propose here what may be called the »book-transmission-hypothesis«: While St. Jerome, engaged in his Latin Psalter versions, seems to have initiated antiquarian studies of related musical instruments, including harps, and while an illustrated Psalter of this type must have existed at Rome soon after 400 A.D., the old - pagan - tradition of harp-playing almost certainly died out in the West, suppressed by the Latin Fathers and Theodosius I. This development is explained here by the role of the harp in Roman society since its origins ca. 200 B.C. and by the character of its sound and music. The illustrations of the lost Psalter of about 400 A.D. are preserved as copies in the Utrecht Psalter of ca. 825 A.D., where the soundbox of the harps points downwards. This may reflect antiquarian studies of Jerome, but probably it was also intended to show that biblical harp-playing was completely different from contemporary practice at Rome (towards 400 A.D.). So the Fathers could more easily damn the instrument. - While the above remarks describe the result of the article, the material is disposed as follows; chapter 1: the names of the instrument, its playing technique and sound character; chapter 2: the harp in Roman society (according to both literary and non-literary sources), in particular the position of the Latin Fathers; chapter 3: the transition from late antiquity to the MA, with special reference to Jerome, Alcuin and the Utrecht Psalter.
- Publication
Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, 2013, Issue 56/57, p7
- ISSN
0075-2541
- Publication type
Article