Ancient Systems
14. Babylonia and Assyria.—We know little about music in ancient Mesopotamia, except that the monuments depict some instruments and imply the use of singing and dancing. We gather that music was a stated element in religious and civic functions, companies of performers forming parts of great processions, and infer that it was under the care of the priesthood.
Among the instruments depicted are harps, dulcimers, lyres of several
shapes, lutes, double pipes, trumpets and drums. The harps have many
strings stretched obliquely from an upright body or back to a horizontal
arm below, but have no pillar. The dulcimers seem to consist of a shallow
box held horizontally, over which metal strings are stretched so as to
be sounded by little hammers (recalling the 'santir' of the modern Persians).
The lyres resemble those later found among the Greeks. The
lutes are allied to those of Hindustan and the Orient generally—actual
examples being found in the earlier strata at Nippur. It is likely that all
Hebrew instruments were based on Babylonian prototypes.
It should be noted that several of the instruments mentioned in Dan. iii. as used in Babylonia under Nebuchadnezzar (605-562 B.C.) have Greek names, whence it is inferred that the author wrote after about 330 B.C., and named instruments then in use.
15. Israel.—The origin of the Hebrews seems to have been
in Arabia, but their geographical position involved close contacts
with Mesopotamia on the one side and with Egypt on the
other. In all matters of culture they were imitators and borrowers,
so that we infer that their music was derived from
outside.
All the important data about Hebrew music come from the Old Testament,
which consists of writings compiled not before about the 8th century
B.C., with some (like Chronicles) hardly earlier than the 3d century.
The older documents are singularly devoid of musical data.
The earliest recorded application of music in a serious way
was by bands of 'prophets' (organized under Samuel before
1000 b.c.) as a means of inducing ecstasy. Probably it was
used in some way in the First Temple (built c. 950 B.C.), though
hardly to the extent often supposed. The services of the Second
Temple (built c. 520 B.C.) certainly included singing with
instrumental accompaniment by trained performers. For these
latter services the Book of Psalms appears, at least in some
part, to have been collected and edited as we have it. In social
life music was probably common, but the references are meagre.
