BOOK CHAP. V. The Arts and Sciences of the Anglo-Saxons. THE art of Music has been as universal as poetry; but, like poetry, has every where existed in different degrees Their Music. of refinement. Among rude nations, it is in a rude and noisy state. Among the more civilized, it has attained all the excellence which science, taste, feeling, and delicate organization can give. We derive the greatest portion of our most interesting music from harmony of parts; and we attain all 'the variety of expression and scientific combination which are familiar to us, by the happy use of our musical notation. The ancients were deficient in both these respects. They had no harmony of parts, and therefore, all their instruments and voices were in unison; and so miserable was their notation, that it has been contended by the learned, with every appearance of truth, that they had no other method of marking time than by the quantity of the syllables of the words placed over the notes. Saint Jerom might therefore well say on music, "Unless "they are retained by the memory sounds perish, because "they cannot be written." The ancients, so late as the days of Cassiodorus, or the sixth century, used three sorts of musical instruments, which he calls the percussionalia, the tensibilia, and the inflatila. The percussionalia were silver or brazen dishes, or such things as, when struck with some force, yielded a sweet ringing. The tensibilia he describes to have consisted of chords, tied 'Jerom ad Dard. de Mus. Instr.-Guido, by his discovery of our musical notation, removed this complaint. .V. with art, which, on being struck with a plectrum, soothed CHAP. the ear with a delightful sound, as the various kinds of cytharæ. The inflatila were wind-instruments, as tubæ, calami, organa, panduria, and such like.' The Anglo-Saxons had the instruments of chords, and wind-instruments. In the drawings on their MSS. we see the horn, trumpet, flute, and harp, and a kind of lyre of four strings, struck by a plectrum. In one MS. we sec a musician striking the four-stringed lyre, while another is accompanying him with two flutes, into which he is blowing at the same time.' In the MSS. which exhibit David and three musicians playing together, David has a harp of eleven strings, which he holds with his left hand while he plays with his right fingers; another is playing on a violin or guitar of four strings with a bow; another blows a short trumpet, supported in the middle by a pole, while another blows a curved horn.* This was probably the representation of an Anglo-Saxon concert. The chord instrument like a violin was perhaps that to which a disciple of Bede alludes, when he expresses how delighted he should be to have " a player who could play on "the cithara, which we call rotæ." 5 Of the harp, Bede mentions, that in all festive companies it was handed round, that every one might sing in turn. It must have therefore been in very common use. Dunstan is also described by his biographer to have carried with him to a house his cythara, "which in our language we call hearpan." He hung it against the wall, and one of the strings happening to sound untouched, it was esteemed a miracle. 2 Cassiod. Op. 2. p. 507. MS. Cott. Cleop. C. 8. MS. Cott. Tib. C. 6. 16 Mag. Bib. p. 88. Snorre calls the musicians in the court of an ancient king of Bede, 1. iv. c. 24. P BOOK The organ was in use among the Anglo-Saxons. Cassiodorus and Fortunatus mention the word organ as a musical instrument, but it has been thought to have been a collection of tubes blowed into by the human breath. Muratori has contended that the art of making organs like ours was known in the eighth century only to the Grecks; that the first organ in Europe was the one sent to Pepin from Greece in 756, and that it was in 826 that a Venetian priest, who had discovered the secret, brought it into France. 8 A passage which I have observed in Aldhelm's poem, De Laude Virginum, entirely overthrows these theories; for he, who died in 709, and who never went to Greece, describes them in a manner which shews that he was acquainted with great organs made on the same principle as our own: Maxima millenis auscultans organa flabris Quamlibet auratis fulgescant cætera capsis. This is literally, 66 Listening to the greatest organs with a "thousand blasts, the car is soothed by the windy bellows, "while the rest shines in the gilt chests." 10 Dunstan, great in all the knowledge of his day, as well as în his ambition, is described to have made an organ of brass pipes, elaborated by musical measures, and filled with air from the bellows.' The bells he made have been mentioned before. About the same time we have the description of an organ made in the church at Ramsey. "The earl devoted thirty pounds to make the copper pipes of organs, which, "resting with their openings in thick order on the spiral winding in the inside, and being struck on feast days with "the strong blast of bellows, emit a sweet melody and a far"resounding peal." 66 ઃઃ In 669, Theodore and Adrian, who planted learning among the Anglo-Saxons, also introduced into Kent the ecclesiastical V. chanting, which Gregory the Great had much improved. CHA P. From Kent it was carried into the other English churches. In 678 one John came also from Rome, and taught in his monastery the Roman mode of singing, and was directed by the pope to diffuse it amongst the rest of the clergy, and left written directions to perpetuate it. Under his auspices it became a popular study in the Saxon monasteries." We have a pleasing proof of the impressive effect of the sacred music of the monks, in the little poem which Canute the Great made upon it. As the monarch, with his queen. and courtiers, were approaching Ely, the monks were at their devotions. The king, attracted by the melody, ordered his rowers to approach it, and to move gently while he listened to the sounds which came floating through the air from the church on the high rock before him. He was so delighted by the effect, that he made a poem on the occasion, of which the first stanza only has come down to us." There are many ancient MSS. of the Anglo-Saxon times, which contain musical notes. The musical talents of Alfred and Anlaf have been noticed in this history; an ardent commendation of the art is made by Bede." The progress of the Anglo-Saxons in the art of design and painting was not very considerable. The talents of their artists varied. The numerous coloured drawings of plants to the Herbarium of Apuleius have merit for the time; but the animals in the same MS. are indifferent." There are also coloured drawings of the things fabled to be in the East, in two MSS. The drawings to Cadmon shew little skill." Many MSS. have the decorations of figures; as the Saxon Calendar, the Gospels, Psalters, and others.' The account 12 See Bede, iv. 2. 18; v. 22. 13 See before, p. 288. 14 Op. Bede, i. p. 353. See it translated in Dr. Henry's History, iv. p. 187. VOL. II. 13 Cott. Lib. MSS, Vitel. C. 3. 16 MS. Tib. B. 5. 17 Cott. MSS. 18 Ibid. 3 G Their Painting. XII. BOOK of the stars, from Cicero's translation of Aratus, contains some very elegant images." A portrait of Dunstan is attempted in one MS. They all exhibit hard outlines. 20 Rome, the great fountain of literature, art, and science, to all the west of Europe, in these barbarous ages, furnished England with her productions in this art. Augustin brought with him from Rome a picture of Christ; and Benedict, in 678, imported from Rome pictures of the Virgin, and of the twelve Apostles, some of the histories in the Evangelists, and some from the subjects in the Apocalypse. These were placed in different parts of the church. In 685 he obtained new supplies of the graphic art. Bede calls them pictures from the Old and New Testament, "executed with wonderful "art and wisdom." He mentions four of these, which were believed to have a typical concordance. The picture of Isaac carrying the wood on which he was to be sacrificed, was placed near the representation of Christ carrying his cross. So the Serpent exalted by Moses was approximated to the Crucifixion." Dunstan excelled in this as in the other arts. He is stated to have diligently cultivated the art of painting, and to have painted for a lady a robe, which she afterwards embroidered." There is a drawing of Christ, with himself kneeling at his feet, of his own performance, in the Bodleian Library.” The Anglo-Saxons were fond of beautifying their MSS. with drawings with ink of various colours, coloured parchment, and sometimes with gilt letters. The Gospels, Nero, D. 4. exhibit a splendid instance of these ornaments. The Franco-theotisc Gospels, Calig. A. 7. are also highly decorated. Many Saxon MSS. in the Cotton Library exhibit very expensive, and what in those days were thought beautiful, illuminations. The art of doing these ornaments has been 19 MS. Cal. A. 7. Tib. B. 5. Nero, D. 4. "Bede Abb. Wer. 295. 297. 22 MS. Cleop. B. 13. |