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COURT MUSICIAN OF THE MIDDLE AGES

After the Painting by Carrier-Belleuse.

PIETRO BLASERNA

(1836-)

ROFESSOR PIETRO BLASERNA, of the Royal University of Rome,

is the author of numerous notable essays on scientific subjects. Among them are "The Principles of the Conservation of Energy" (1864); “Inductive Currents"; and "The Dynamic Theory of Heat" (1872). This latter essay was followed by "The Theory of Sound in Its Relation to Music" (1875), which was at once translated into French, English, and other languages.

Blaserna was educated at the University of Vienna and in Paris, where he was attached to the Laboratory of Regnault. In 1863 he became a professor in the University of Palermo, and in 1878 in that of Rome, where he was put in charge of the Italian Laboratory of the Physical Sciences.

PR

MUSIC, ANCIENT AND MODERN

RIMITIVE music is as ancient as history itself. From the high plains of Asia, where many ancient historical traces of it are found, it followed man in his wanderings through China, India, and Egypt. One of the most ancient books, the Bible, speaks of music often and from its earliest pages.

David and Solomon were very musical. They composed psalms full of inspiration, and evidently intended to be sung. To the latter is due the magnificent organizations of the singing in the Temple at Jerusalem. He founded a school for singers, and a considerable band, which at last reached the number of four thousand trumpeters, the principal instruments being the harp, the cithern, the trumpet, and the drum.

It is incontestably established that the Greeks had no true principle of harmony even in their most prosperous times. The only thing that they did in this respect was to accompany in octaves when men and boys executed the same melody.

Thus their instrumentation only served to reinforce the voice part, whether it was played in unison or in octaves, or whether

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