364 CLASSICAL REVIEW

1
Verhandelingen van de Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en schoone
Kunsten van Belgie - Klasse der Letteren 41 (1979), nr. 92.
2
= Festschrift zum 100-jdhrigen Bestehen der Papyrussammlung der Osterreichischen
Nationalbibliothek - Papyrus Erzherzog Rainer, 2 vols. Vienna, 1983.
3
Cf. E. G. Turner, Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World (Oxford, 1971), 18.

GREEK MUSIC
ANDREW BARKER: Greek Musical Writings,!: The Musician and his
Art. (Cambridge Readings in the Literature of Music.) Pp. xv+332;
17 half-tone reproductions, 4 diagrams. Cambridge University Press,
1984. £27.50.
This is the first of two volumes containing literary sources for Greek music, in
translation and extensively annotated. It offers passages from Homer, Hesiod, the
Homeric Hymns, the lyric poets, drama, Xenophon (Symposium), Plato, Aristotle, the
Aristotelian Problems, the Hibeh papyrus, Theophrastus (on the preparation of
aulos-reeds), ps.-Plutarch nepi fj.ovaiKTJs (complete), and Athenaeus. The second
volume is to be devoted to more technical writers on harmonic and acoustic theory.
A short introduction explains the various instruments, with a selection of illustrations
from vase paintings, etc. There are further brief introductions to the individual
chapters, each of which corresponds to one author or genre. In two cases, ' From
Archilochus to the late sixth century' and 'The musical revolution of the later fifth
century', the chapter takes the form of an independent essay rather than a collection
of source material, because most of the evidence is embedded in ps.-Plutarch and
Athenaeus, which Barker did not want to dismember. Substantial appendices to the
Plato and ps.-Plutarch chapters provide discussions of the ancient harmoniai and
nomoi.
The emphasis is on the archaic and classical periods; the later writers are admitted
because of the very large amount of information they have to give about early
musicians. Completeness is not attempted. For example, the Plato selections are
limited to Ion, Republic, and Laws (other references being listed in a footnote). I would
gladly have had more from the lyric and elegiac poets1 and Aristophanes2 in exchange
for some of the tragic excerpts that merely refer to ' lyre-less music' or to singing and
dancing for joy. A regrettable omission is the text irepl rpaywhias, thought to be by
Michael Psellus, that Robert Browning published in 1963:3 I suspect that it has
escaped B.'s notice, as there are several places where he ought to have cited it.4
The arrangement of material posed obvious problems. As the systematic accounts
of genus and mode are reserved for the second volume, they have to be explained here
in an ad hoc way where they arise, in disconnected notes which the uninitiated will
find it hard to synthesise. In the tragedy chapter B. makes a rough division by topics,
but elsewhere he follows the order of the texts, so that material bearing on any given
subject is liable to be very scattered. I think it might after all have been preferable
to sort out to some extent the jumbled learning compiled by ps.-Plutarch and
Athenaeus: it is not as if one would be spoiling significant literary unities. Fortunately
the book is well indexed.
The translations, all new, are conscientious, and B. makes clear, wherever it matters,
what Greek word is being used.5 The notes are generally excellent: clear, sober, to
the point, and full of information and references to other sources (though only rarely

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 CLASSICAL REVIEW 365
6
to modern discussions). In the earlier chapters one is occasionally aware of some
superfluity; B. did not really need to tell us why he translates aXfeoifioiai as
' marriageable', or that he reads e\o>v at H. Herm. 497. There is a modest bibliography,
almost confined to works in English.
Here are some notes on details (bold type refers to B.'s pagination). 20 n. 4, anti-
phonal laments in tragedy: Septem 96Iff. and Tro. 1287ff. should not be omitted.
'Aesch. Suppl. 71-8': transfer to Eur. Suppl. 23 n. 12: 'Diog. Laert. VIII. 1.25' is a
totally wrong reference. 26: opvvrai in Od. 1.347 means 'speeds', not 'urges him';
the singer's mental journeying disappears from the translation also at 8.74 (01^17?),
492 (neTdp-qOi), 499 (6pfii}0eis). 39: 'Proclus (320a20)' should read 'Proclus
(Chrestom. ap. Phot. Bibl. 320a 20)'. 48: the view that Stesichorus' works were choral is
now much disputed. 49: a four-stringed phorminx is not likely to have had the compass
of a whole octave. I would guess that its strings sounded an enharmonic trichord and
the note a tone below, defa, with melodies tending to come to rest on the e. 49 n.
7: it would be appropriate to refer here to Ion's poem on the eleven-stringed lyre, and
to certain vases. 50: harp-playing with a plectrum is not unknown: see D. Paquette,
UInstrument de musique dans la ceramique de la Grece antique (Paris, 1984), 191. 50
n. 13: av\6s in this Archilochus fragment (42 W.) is a drinking-tube, not a musical
instrument. Fr. 121 should be cited instead. 59 n. 19: for schoinoteneios read
schoinotenes, and compare the axotviaiv vofios (209,252). 93: B. fails to make the point
that astrophic song allowed melody to follow the word accents. 96:1 take Timotheus
to be saying (surprising though it is) that Terpander used ten notes. 203: for Geryone
read Geryones, and add a reference to Nicomachus TrGF 127F3. 234: it may be
Krexos, not Archilochus, who is being credited with inventing heterophonic accom-
paniment; this interpretation is supported by the contrast with ol apxaioi. 250ff.: B.
suggests that vofios developed into a technical term only in the fifth century. He
overlooks the fact that Hipponax mentioned the KpaSias V6/J.OS (fr. 153 W.). 281
'Cion': Lobel corrected the name to Cicon on discovering the name (again associated
with that of Codalus) in Hipponax (fr. 118 W.). Several misprints were noted, including
'Bellermania' for 'Bellermanniana' (xiii) and 'Philius' for 'Phlius' (212 n. 53).
Minor flaws notwithstanding, this is a solid, substantial, scholarly piece of work
that everyone with an interest in Greek music, whether he knows Greek or not, will
find of value. It is perhaps not ideal as a first introduction to the subject, for reasons
; I have indicated; and it is a little surprising to find no mention of the fact that actual
i fragments of ancient Greek music survive, one or two of them pre-Hellenistic. Perhaps
/ they are to be noticed in Vol. 2. But let us be grateful for what we have received, and
-, hope that the completion of the set will not be long delayed.
1 Royal Holloway & Bedford New College, London M. L. W E S T
e
' E.g. Alan. 38-41, 98, Stes. 212, Carm. conv. 900, Archil. 121, Hippon. 118, Theogn. 237ff.,
U , 53W, 757-64, 773-9, 789-94, 939-44, 1055-8.
2
E.g. Lys. 13O5ff., Eccl. 880ff./911ff.
3
n I rEPAS (Studies presented to G. Thomson), 67ff.
4
Pp. 63 and 225 n. 131, on the use of the chromatic genus in tragedy; 203 n. 95 and 221 n.
/ 110 on Mixolydian.
5
Greek words are transliterated throughout, with some inconsistency as between oi and oe,
ai and ae. C.U.P.'s reader ought also to have corrected the breaking of 'Hypophrygian' after
'Hypop-' (283 n. 115), and the slip 'Nomadoi' for 'Nomades' (275).
6
Another complaint to the publisher: cross-references, especially to the longer prose passages,
are maddeningly difficult to check, because the canonical page-numbers (Stephanus, Casaubon,
etc.) are so discreetly hidden in the body of the text. In my copy I have thought it worth while
to touch them up with an orange highlighter.

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