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64-464: They were: In most Greek sources the word melikos (from melos , "song") is used to refer to these poets, but the variant lyrikos (from lyra , " lyre ") became the regular form in both Latin (as lyricus ) and in modern languages. The ancient scholars defined the genre on the basis of the musical accompaniment, not the content. Thus, some types of poetry which would be included under the label " lyric poetry " in modern criticism , are excluded—namely,

128-607: A 'pivot area' surrounded by an 'inner crescent', Alfred Thayer Mahan's Middle East , and Friedrich Naumann's Mitteleuropa . In current usage, the Fertile Crescent includes Israel , Palestine , Iraq , Syria , Lebanon , Egypt , and Jordan , as well as the surrounding portions of Turkey and Iran . In addition to the Tigris and Euphrates , riverwater sources include the Jordan River . The inner boundary

192-529: A Greek lyre appears in the famous sarcophagus of Hagia Triada (a Minoan settlement in Crete ). The sarcophagus was used during the Mycenaean occupation of Crete ( c.  1400 BCE ). The lyre of classical antiquity was ordinarily played by being strummed like a guitar or a zither , rather than being plucked with the fingers as with a harp. A pick called a plectrum was held in one hand, while

256-522: A feature also found later in Samaria (c. 375–323 BCE). In contrast, thin lyres in Syria and Phoenicia (c. 700 BCE) were symmetrical in shape and had straight arms with a perpendicular yoke which formed the outline of a rectangle. The kinnor is an ancient Israelite musical instrument that is thought to be a type of thin lyre based on iconographic archaeological evidence. It is the first instrument from

320-522: A figure wearing a torc playing a seven-string lyre. The Germanic lyre is representative of a separate strand of lyre development. Appearing in warrior graves of the first millennium CE, these lyres differ from the lyres of the Mediterranean antiquity, by a long, shallow and broadly rectangular shape, with a hollow soundbox curving at the base, and two hollow arms connected across the top by an integrated crossbar or ‘yoke. Famous examples include

384-477: A flat base and bull's head on one side. The lyres of Ur are bull lyres excavated in ancient Mesopotamia (modern Iraq ), which date to 2500 BCE and are considered to be the world's oldest surviving stringed instruments . However, older pictorial evidence of bull lyres exist in other parts of Mesopotamia and Elam , including Susa . Thick lyres are a type of flat-based eastern lyre that comes from Egypt (2000–100 BCE) and Anatolia (c. 1600 BCE). The thick lyre

448-562: A long history of irrigation. Prehistoric seedless figs were discovered at Gilgal I in the Jordan Valley , suggesting that fig trees were being planted some 11,400 years ago. Cereals were already grown in Syria as long as 9,000 years ago. Small cats ( Felis silvestris ) also were domesticated in this region. Also, legumes including peas , lentils and chickpea were domesticated in this region. Domesticated animals include

512-470: A type of flat-based eastern lyre of immense size that typically required two players. Played from a standing position, the instrument stood taller than the instrumentalists. The oldest extent example of the instrument was found in the ancient city of Uruk in what is present day Iraq, and dates to c. 2500 BCE. Well preserved giant lyres dating to c. 1600 BCE have been found in Anatolia. The instrument reached

576-503: A type of flat-based eastern lyre with a thinner soundbox where the sound hole is created by leaving the base of the resonator open. The earliest known example of the thin lyre dates to c. 2500 BCE in Syria . After this, examples of the thin lyre can be found throughout the Fertile Crescent . The thin lyre is the only one of the ancient eastern lyres that is still used in instrument design today among current practitioners of

640-441: Is a stringed musical instrument that is classified by Hornbostel–Sachs as a member of the lute family of instruments . In organology , a lyre is considered a yoke lute , since it is a lute in which the strings are attached to a yoke that lies in the same plane as the sound table , and consists of two arms and a crossbar. The lyre has its origins in ancient history . Lyres were used in several ancient cultures surrounding

704-460: Is believed to be the first region where settled farming emerged as people started the process of clearance and modification of natural vegetation to grow newly domesticated plants as crops . Early human civilizations such as Sumer in Mesopotamia flourished as a result. Technological advances in the region include the development of agriculture and the use of irrigation , of writing ,

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768-653: Is delimited by the dry climate of the Syrian Desert to the south. Around the outer boundary are the Anatolian and Armenian highlands to the north, the Sahara Desert to the west, Sudan to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east. As crucial as rivers and marshlands were to the rise of civilization in the Fertile Crescent, they were not the only factor. The area is geographically important as

832-404: Is distinguished by a thicker sound box which allowed for the inclusion of more strings. These strings were held on a larger 'box-bridge' than the other type of eastern lyres, and the sound hole of the instrument was cut in the body of the lyre behind the box-bridge. While similar to the bull lyre in size, the thick lyre did not contain the head of an animal, but did depict images of animals on

896-471: The Basques and Canary Islanders of the same time period, as the studies demonstrate those ancient peoples to be "clearly associated with modern Europeans". Additionally, no evidence from the studies demonstrates Cro-Magnon influence, contrary to former suggestions. The studies further suggest a diffusion of this diverse population away from the Fertile Crescent, with the early migrants moving away from

960-522: The Bronze Age , the region's natural fertility has been greatly extended by irrigation works, upon which much of its agricultural production continues to depend. The last two millennia have seen repeated cycles of decline and recovery as past works have fallen into disrepair through the replacement of states, to be replaced under their successors. Another ongoing problem has been salination —gradual concentration of salt and other minerals in soils with

1024-605: The Byzantine lyra . After the bow made its way into Europe from the Middle-East , it was applied to several species of those lyres that were small enough to make bowing practical. The dates of origin and other evolutionary details of the European bowed lyres continue to be disputed among organologists, but there is general agreement that none of them were the ancestors of modern orchestral bowed stringed instruments, as once

1088-574: The Fertile Crescent ( Mesoptamia ) in what is present day Syria, Anatolia, the Levant and Egypt. The eastern lyres all contain sound boxes with flat bases. They are the oldest lyres with iconographical evidence of their existence, such as depictions of the eastern lyre on pottery, dating back to 2700 BCE. While flat-based lyres originated in the East, they were also later found in the West after 700 BCE. By

1152-461: The Greek . Hornbostel–Sachs classifies the lyre as a member of the lute-family of instruments which is one of the families under the chordophone classification of instruments. Hornbostel–Sachs divide lyres into two groups Bowl lyres ( 321.21 ), Box lyres ( 321.22 ). In organology , a lyre is considered a yoke lute , since it is a lute in which the strings are attached to a yoke that lies in

1216-484: The Hellenistic period (c. 330 BCE) what was once a clearly divided use of flat-based lyres in the East and round-based lyres in the West had disappeared, as trade routes between the East and the West dispersed both kinds of instruments across more geographic regions. Eastern lyres are divided into four main types: bull lyres, thick lyres, thin lyres and giant lyres. Bull lyres are a type of eastern lyre that have

1280-585: The Mediterranean Sea . The earliest known examples of the lyre have been recovered at archeological sites that date to c. 2700 BCE in Mesopotamia . The oldest lyres from the Fertile Crescent are known as the eastern lyres and are distinguished from other ancient lyres by their flat base. They have been found at archaeological sites in Egypt , Syria , Anatolia , and the Levant . The round lyre or

1344-525: The Near East —westward into Europe and North Africa , northward to Crimea , and northeastward to Mongolia . They took their agricultural practices with them and interbred with the hunter-gatherers whom they subsequently came in contact with while perpetuating their farming practices. This supports prior genetic and archaeological studies which have all arrived at the same conclusion. Consequently, contemporary in situ peoples absorbed

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1408-1028: The Tigris–Euphrates river basin , including Sumer , Akkad , Babylonia , Assyria , and the Abbasid Caliphate . It is in this region where the first libraries appeared about 4,500 years ago. The oldest known libraries are found in Nippur (in Sumer) and Ebla (in Syria), both from c.  2500 BCE . Both the Tigris and Euphrates start in the Taurus Mountains of what is modern-day Turkey . Farmers in southern Mesopotamia had to protect their fields from flooding each year. Northern Mesopotamia had sufficient rain to make some farming possible. To protect against flooding they made levees. Since

1472-660: The Western lyre also originated in Syria and Anatolia, but was not as widely used and eventually died out in the east c. 1750 BCE. The round lyre, so called for its rounded base, reappeared in ancient Greece c. 1700–1400 BCE, and then later spread throughout the Roman Empire . This lyre served as the origin of the European lyre known as the Germanic lyre or rotte that was widely used in north-western Europe from pre-Christian to medieval times. The earliest reference to

1536-474: The cattle , sheep , goat , domestic pig , cat , and domestic goose . Mesopotamia Egypt Iran Anatolia The Levant Arabia Cosmology Modern analyses comparing 24 craniofacial measurements reveal a relatively diverse population within the pre- Neolithic , Neolithic and Bronze Age Fertile Crescent, supporting the view that several populations occupied this region during these time periods. Similar arguments do not hold true for

1600-421: The elegy and iambus which were performed with flutes . The Nine Lyric Poets are traditionally divided among those who primarily composed choral verses, and those who composed monodic verses. This division is contested by some modern scholars. Antipater of Thessalonica proposes an alternative canon of nine female poets. Lyre The lyre ( / ˈ l aɪər / ) (from Greek λύρα and Latin lyra)

1664-415: The phorminx and kitharis . However, both of these terms have not had uniform meaning across time, and their use during Homer's time was later altered. Today, scholars divide instruments referred to as kitharis into two subgroups, the round-based cylinder kithara and the flat-based concert kithara. In Ancient Greece , recitations of lyric poetry were accompanied by lyre playing. The earliest picture of

1728-519: The wheel , and glass , most emerging first in Mesopotamia . The term "Fertile Crescent" was popularized by archaeologist James Henry Breasted in Outlines of European History (1914) and Ancient Times, A History of the Early World (1916). He wrote: It lies like an army facing south, with one wing stretching along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean and the other reaching out to

1792-469: The "bridge" between North Africa and Eurasia , which has allowed it to retain a greater amount of biodiversity than either Europe or North Africa , where climate changes during the Ice Age led to repeated extinction events when ecosystems became squeezed against the waters of the Mediterranean Sea . The Saharan pump theory posits that this Middle Eastern land bridge was extremely important to

1856-879: The Iron Age industrial settlement in the Ramsau valley at Dürrnberg , Austria. Possible further wooden tuning pegs have been found in Glastonbury in Somerset in England and Biskupin in Poland. The remains of what is thought to be the bridge of a 2300-year-old lyre were discovered on the Isle of Skye , Scotland in 2010. In 1988, a stone bust from the 2nd or 1st century BCE was discovered in Brittany, France which depicts

1920-484: The Persian Gulf, while the center has its back against the northern mountains. The end of the western wing is Palestine; Assyria makes up a large part of the center; while the end of the eastern wing is Babylonia. [...] This great semicircle, for lack of a name, may be called the Fertile Crescent. There is no single term for this region in antiquity. At the time that Breasted was writing, it roughly corresponded with

1984-432: The agricultural way of life of those early migrants who ventured out of the Fertile Crescent. This is contrary to the suggestion that the spread of agriculture disseminated out of the Fertile Crescent by way of sharing of knowledge. Instead, the view now supported by a preponderance of evidence is that it occurred by actual migration out of the region, coupled with subsequent interbreeding with indigenous local populations whom

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2048-410: The ancient Greeks to Egyptian box instruments reveals the apparent similarities recognized by Greeks themselves. The cultural peak of ancient Egypt , and thus the possible age of the earliest instruments of this type, predates the 5th century classic Greece . This indicates the possibility that the lyre might have existed in one of Greece's neighboring countries, either Thrace , Lydia , or Egypt , and

2112-457: The ancient history that were extant in the Aegean , Greece and Italy . They initially contained only round rather than flat bases; but by the Hellenistic period both constructs of lyre could be found in these regions. Like the flat-based Eastern lyres, the round-based lyre also originated in northern Syria and southern Anatolia in the 3rd millennium BCE. However, this round-based construction of

2176-556: The arms or yoke of the instrument. Like the bull lyre, the thick lyre did not use use a plectrum but was plucked by hand. While the clearest examples of the thick lyre are extant to archaeological sites in Egypt and Anatolia, similar large lyres with thicker soundboxes have been found in Mesopotamia (1900–1500 BCE). However, these Mesopotamia lyres lack the box-bridge found in the instruments from Egypt and Anatolia. Thin lyres are

2240-491: The evolution of many "r" type annual plants , which produce more edible seeds than "K" type perennial plants . The region's dramatic variety in elevation gave rise to many species of edible plants for early experiments in cultivation. Most importantly, the Fertile Crescent was home to the eight Neolithic founder crops important in early agriculture (i.e., wild progenitors to emmer wheat , einkorn , barley , flax , chick pea , pea , lentil , bitter vetch ), and four of

2304-465: The finger gave the string a greater vibrating length, thereby producing a tone lower in pitch. This is the principle on which the modern violin and guitar work. The term is also used metaphorically to refer to the work or skill of a poet, as in Shelley's "Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is" or Byron's "I wish to tune my quivering lyre, / To deeds of fame, and notes of fire". Over time,

2368-429: The fingers of the free hand silenced the unwanted strings. A classical lyre has a hollow body or sound-chest (also known as soundbox or resonator), which, in ancient Greek tradition, was made out of turtle shell. Extending from this sound-chest are two raised arms, which are sometimes hollow, and are curved both outward and forward. They are connected near the top by a crossbar or yoke. An additional crossbar, fixed to

2432-460: The five most important species of domesticated animals— cows , goats , sheep , and pigs ; the fifth species, the horse , lived nearby. The Fertile Crescent flora comprises a high percentage of plants that can self-pollinate , but may also be cross-pollinated . These plants, called " selfers ", were one of the geographical advantages of the area because they did not depend on other plants for reproduction. As well as possessing many sites with

2496-488: The height of its popularity in Ancient Egypt during the reign of Pharaoh Akhenaten (c. 1353—1336 BCE). A giant lyre found in the ancient city of Susa (c. 2500 BCE) is suspected to have been played by only a single instrumentalist, and giant lyres in Egypt dating from the Hellenistic period most likely also required only a single player. Western lyres, sometimes referred to as round-based lyres, are lyres from

2560-669: The herd of cattle for the lyre. Hence, the creation of the lyre is attributed to Hermes. Other sources credit it to Apollo himself. Some of the cultures using and developing the lyre were the Aeolian and Ionian Greek colonies on the coasts of Asia (ancient Asia Minor , modern day Turkey ) bordering the Lydian empire. Some mythic masters like Musaeus , and Thamyris were believed to have been born in Thrace , another place of extensive Greek colonization. The name kissar ( cithara ) given by

2624-486: The instrument. As a means of support, players of the thin lyre wear a sling around the left wrist which is also attached to the base of the lyre's right arm. It is played using a plectrum or pic to strike the strings; a technique later used by the Greeks on the western lyres. There are several regional variations in the design of thin lyres. The Egyptian thin lyre was characterized by arms that bulged outwards asymmetrically;

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2688-680: The lyre family mentioned in the Old Testament . Its exact identification is unclear, but in the modern day it is generally translated as "harp" or "lyre", and associated with a type of lyre depicted in Israelite imagery, particularly the Bar Kochba coins. It has been referred to as the "national instrument" of the Jewish people, and modern luthiers have created reproduction lyres of the "kinnor" based on this imagery. Giant lyres are

2752-710: The lyre from the ship burial at Sutton Hoo , and the decayed lyre discovered in silhouette at the Prittlewell royal Anglo-Saxon burial in Essex. The waterlogged lyre recovered from a grave at Trossingen , Germany, in 2001 is the best-preserved example found so far. Some instruments called "lyres" were played with a bow in Europe and parts of the Middle East , namely the Arabic rebab and its descendants, including

2816-495: The lyre was less common than its flat-based counterparts in the east, and by c. 1750 BCE the instrument had died out completely in this region. The round-based lyre re-appeared in the West in Ancient Greece where it was sole form of lyre used between 1400 BCE and 700 BCE. Like the eastern flat-based lyre, the western round-based lyre also had several sub-types. Homer described two different western lyres in his writings,

2880-455: The migrants came in contact with. The studies show also that not all present day Europeans share strong genetic affinities to the Neolithic and Bronze Age inhabitants of the Fertile Crescent; the closest ties to the Fertile Crescent rest with Southern Europeans. The same study further demonstrates all present-day Europeans to be closely related. Linguistically, the Fertile Crescent

2944-469: The modern distribution of Old World flora and fauna , including the spread of humanity . The area has borne the brunt of the tectonic divergence between the African and Arabian plates and the converging Arabian and Eurasian plates, which has made the region a very diverse zone of high snow-covered mountains. The Fertile Crescent had many diverse climates , and major climatic changes encouraged

3008-403: The musicians of the archaic period Olympus and Terpander , that they used only three strings to accompany their recitation; but there is no evidence for or against this dating from that period. The earliest known lyre had four strings, tuned to create a tetrachord or series of four tones filling in the interval of a perfect fourth. By doubling the tetrachord a lyre with seven or eight strings

3072-881: The name in the wider Hellenic space came to be used to label mostly bowed lutes such as the Byzantine lyra , the Pontic lyra , the Constantinopolitan lyra , the Cretan lyra , the lira da braccio , the Calabrian lira , the lijerica , the lyra viol , the lirone . Fertile Crescent The Fertile Crescent ( Arabic : الهلال الخصيب ) is a crescent-shaped region in the Middle East , spanning modern-day Iraq , Israel , Jordan , Lebanon , Palestine , and Syria , together with northern Kuwait , south-eastern Turkey , and western Iran . Some authors also include Cyprus and northern Egypt . The Fertile Crescent

3136-473: The rivers Tigris and Euphrates , lies in the east of the Fertile Crescent), also saw the emergence of early complex societies during the succeeding Bronze Age . There is also early evidence from the region for writing and the formation of hierarchical state level societies. This has earned the region the nickname "The cradle of civilization ". From ancient times empires arose and fell in

3200-442: The same plane as the sound table , and consists of two arms and a crossbar. There is evidence of the development of many forms of lyres from the period 2700 BCE through 700 BCE. Lyres from the ancient world are divided by scholars into two separate groups, the eastern lyres and the western lyres, which are defined by patterns of geography and chronology. Eastern lyres, also known as flat-based lyres, are lyres which originated in

3264-819: The skeletal and cultural remains of both pre-modern and early modern humans (e.g., at Tabun and Es Skhul caves), later Pleistocene hunter-gatherers , and Epipalaeolithic semi-sedentary hunter-gatherers (the Natufians ); the Fertile Crescent is most famous for its sites related to the origins of agriculture . The western zone around the Jordan and upper Euphrates rivers gave rise to the first known Neolithic farming settlements (referred to as Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA)), which date to around 9,000 BCE and includes very ancient sites such as Göbekli Tepe , Chogha Golan , and Jericho (Tell es-Sultan) . This region, alongside Mesopotamia (Greek for "between rivers", between

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3328-436: The sound-chest, makes the bridge, which transmits the vibrations of the strings. The deepest note was that closest to the player's body; since the strings did not differ much in length, more weight may have been gained for the deeper notes by thicker strings, as in the violin and similar modern instruments, or they were tuned by having a slacker tension . The strings were of gut (animal intestines). They were stretched between

3392-562: The string. The last of the bowed lyres with a fingerboard was the "modern" ( c.  1485–1800 ) Welsh crwth . It had several predecessors both in the British Isles and in Continental Europe. Pitch was changed on individual strings by pressing the string firmly against the fingerboard with the fingertips. Like a violin, this method shortened the vibrating length of the string to produce higher tones, while releasing

3456-421: The strings as being damped by the fingers of the left hand of the player, after having been struck by the plectrum held in the right hand. According to ancient Greek mythology , the young god Hermes stole a herd of sacred cows from Apollo. In order not to be followed, he made shoes for the cows which were facing backwards, making it appear that the animals had walked in the opposite direction. Apollo, following

3520-589: The territories of the Ottoman Empire ceded to Britain and France in the Sykes–Picot Agreement . Historian Thomas Scheffler has noted that Breasted was following a trend in Western geography to "overwrite the classical geographical distinctions between continents, countries and landscapes with large, abstract spaces", drawing parallels with the work of Halford Mackinder , who conceptualised Eurasia as

3584-455: The trails, could not follow where the cows were going. Along the way, Hermes slaughtered one of the cows and offered all but the entrails to the gods. From the entrails and a tortoise / turtle shell , he created the Lyre. Apollo, figuring out it was Hermes who had his cows, confronted the young god. Apollo was furious, but after hearing the sound of the lyre, his anger faded. Apollo offered to trade

3648-520: The word "lyre" is the Mycenaean Greek ru-ra-ta-e , meaning "lyrists" and written in the Linear B script. In classical Greek, the word "lyre" could either refer specifically to an amateur instrument, which is a smaller version of the professional cithara and eastern- Aegean barbiton , or "lyre" can refer generally to all three instruments as a family. The English word comes via Latin from

3712-438: The yoke and bridge, or to a tailpiece below the bridge. There were two ways of tuning: one was to fasten the strings to pegs that might be turned, while the other was to change the placement of the string on the crossbar; it is likely that both expedients were used simultaneously. Lyres were used without a fingerboard , no Greek description or representation having ever been met with that can be construed as referring to one. Nor

3776-447: Was a bow possible, the flat sound-board being an insuperable impediment. The pick, or plectrum, however, was in constant use. It was held in the right hand to set the upper strings in vibration; when not in use, it hung from the instrument by a ribbon. The fingers of the left hand touched the lower strings (presumably to silence those whose notes were not wanted). Before Greek civilization had assumed its historic form (c. 1200 BCE), there

3840-882: Was a region of great diversity. Historically, Semitic languages generally prevailed in the modern regions of Iraq , Syria , Jordan , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Sinai and the fringes of southeast Turkey and northwest Iran , as well as the Sumerian (a language isolate ) in Iraq, whilst in the mountainous areas to the east and north a number of generally unrelated language isolates were found, including; Elamite , Gutian and Kassite in Iran , and Hattic , Kaskian and Hurro-Urartian in Turkey. The precise affiliation of these, and their date of arrival, remain topics of scholarly discussion. However, given lack of textual evidence for

3904-856: Was introduced into Greece at pre-classic times. Other instruments known as lyres have been fashioned and used in Europe outside the Greco-Roman world since at least the Iron Age . Lyres are depicted on ceramic and bronze vessels of the Proto-Celtic Hallstatt culture across central Europe. Among them there are lyres with rounded bottoms, stringed instruments whose resonators seem to be missing and lyres with strongly curved yokes and single or double bulging resonators. The number of strings depicted varies from two to ten. Fragmented tuning pegs and bridges made of wood have been discovered from

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3968-523: Was likely to have been great freedom and independence of different localities in the matter of lyre stringing, which is corroborated by the antique use of the chromatic (half-tone) and enharmonic ( quarter-tone ) tunings - pointing to an early exuberance, and perhaps also to a bias towards refinements of intonation. The number of strings on the classical lyre therefore varied, with three, four, six, seven, eight and ten having been popular at various times. The priest and biographer Plutarch (c. 100 CE) wrote of

4032-399: Was obtained. Likewise the three-stringed lyre may have given rise to the six-stringed lyre depicted on many archaic Greek vases. The accuracy of this representation cannot be insisted upon, the vase painters being little mindful of the complete expression of details; yet one may suppose their tendency would be rather to imitate than to invent a number. It was their constant practice to represent

4096-529: Was thought. There came to be two different kinds of bowed European lyres: those with fingerboards, and those without. The last surviving examples of instruments within the latter class were the Scandinavian talharpa and the Finnish jouhikko . Different tones could be obtained from a single bowed string by pressing the fingernails of the player's left hand against various points along the string to fret

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