Story of the Flute
discantus or soprano, alto, tenor, and bass. They are very similar to the instrument portrayed by Virdung, even to the two little lines drawn across the tube immediately above the mouth-hole. In this work we meet for the first time with a diagram (Page 30, Fig. 2) showing the fingering of the holes, and very curious it is. The D hole[1] is to be covered by the first finger of the left hand, and the G hole with the first finger of the right hand. According to the present English numbering of the fingers, this could only be done by crossing the hands palm to palm, a position in which it would be impossible to play. But possibly the early German numbering of the fingers began with the little finger as number one. Even so, it is hard to understand this diagram: what was to be done with the first finger of each hand?
All these early illustrations (which appear to be copied from one another) represent the flute as a cylinder of equal diameter throughout, with very small finger-holes and without any joints. ThePrætorius two lines above the mouth-hole are evidently only for ornament. The earliest illustration of a jointed flute is to be found in the Theatrum Instrumentorium seu Sciagraphia of Michaelis Prætorius (i.e., Schultheis, or Schultz), published at Wolfenbuttel in 1615-20, in illustration of the author's Syntagma Musicum. Prætorius introduces pictures of four flutes (of which he gives the28
- ↑ We have no evidence as to the exact pitch of these early flutes; but I have, for sake of clearness, assumed throughout that the lowest note was D, as in the ordinary German flute of later years.
