Lyra was a medieval pear-shaped bowed string instrument with three to five strings, held upright and is an ancestor of most European bowed instruments, including the violin. The Persian geographer of the 9th century (Ibn Khordadbeh), mentioned in his lexicographical discussion of music instruments that in the Byzantine Empire typical instruments included the urghun (organ), shilyani (probably a type of harp or lyre), salandj (probably a bagpipe) and the Byzantine lyra (Greek: λύρα ~ lūrā). Lyres propagated through the same areas, as far east as Estonia.Įuropean music between 8 became more sophisticated, more frequently requiring instruments capable of polyphony. Various harps served Central and Northern Europe as far north as Ireland, where the harp eventually became a national symbol. The central and northern regions used mainly lutes, stringed instruments with necks, while the southern region used lyres, which featured a two-armed body and a crossbar. Stringed instruments were prominent in Middle Age Europe. The lyre is the only musical instrument that may have been invented in Europe until this period. Various lutes, zithers, dulcimers, and harps spread as far as Madagascar to the south and modern-day Sulawesi to the east.ĭespite the influences of Greece and Rome, most musical instruments in Europe during the Middles Ages came from Asia. Persian miniatures provide information on the development of kettle drums in Mesopotamia that spread as far as Java. Conical oboes were involved in the music that accompanied wedding and circumcision ceremonies. Frame drums and cylindrical drums of various depths were immensely important in all genres of music. The areas of Mesopotamia and the Arabian Peninsula experiences rapid growth and sharing of musical instruments once they were united by Islamic culture in the seventh century. While the gong likely originated in the geographical area between Tibet and Burma, it was part of every category of human activity in Maritime Southeast Asia including Java. The most prominent and important musical instrument of Southeast Asia was the gong. Balinese and Javanese music made use of xylophones and metallophones, bronze versions of the former. Southeast Asian musical innovations include those during a period of Indian influence that ended around 920 AD. Persian influence brought oboes and sitars, although Persian sitars had three strings and Indian version had from four to seven. Islamic influences brought new types of drums, perfectly circular or octagonal as opposed to the irregular pre-Islamic drums. Tubular drums, stick zithers named veena, short fiddles, double and triple flutes, coiled trumpets, and curved India horns emerged in this time period. The gong-like instrument was a bronze disk that was struck with a hammer instead of a mallet. In pre-Islamic times, idiophones such hand bells, cymbals, and peculiar instruments resembling gongs came into wide use in Hindu music. Historians divide the development of musical instruments in medieval India between pre-Islamic and Islamic periods due to the different influence each period provided. The emphasis on rhythm is an aspect native to Indian music. Rhythm was of paramount importance in Indian music of the time, as evidenced by the frequent depiction of drums in reliefs dating to the Middle Ages. This flexibility suited the slides and tremolos of Hindu music. While stringed instruments of China were designed to produce precise tones capable of matching the tones of chimes, stringed instruments of India were considerably more flexible. India experienced similar development to China in the Middle Ages however, stringed instruments developed differently to accommodate different styles of music. Some of the first bowed-zithers appeared in China in the 9th or 10th century, influenced by Mongolian culture. Cymbals gained popularity, along with more advanced trumpets, clarinets, oboes, flutes, drums, and lutes. In fact, Chinese tradition attributes many musical instruments from this period to those regions and countries. Influences from Middle East, Persia, India, Mongolia, and other countries followed. The first record of this type of influence is in 384 AD, when China established an orchestra in its imperial court after a conquest in Turkestan. During the period of time loosely referred to as the Middle Ages, China developed a tradition of integrating musical influence from other regions.
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