Organistrum
Santiago de Compostela, Spain
The organistrum is an early form of
Origins
The word organistrum is derived from organum and instrumentum; the former term was applied to the primitive harmonies, consisting of octaves accompanied by fourths or fifths, first practised by Hucbald in the 10th century.[3] This explanation allows tolerable certainty about the period of its invention, at the end of the 10th or beginning of the 11th century. It also explains its construction. A stringed instrument of the period — such as a guitar fiddle, a rotta or oval vielle — was used as a model, while the proportions were increased for the convenience of holding the instrument and of dividing the performance between two persons (this happened in early models). Inside the body was the wheel, rosined like the bow of a violin, to create friction in its 3 melodic strings. The three strings resting on the wheel and supported on a bridge of the same height sounded together as the wheel revolved. In the earliest examples the wooden tangents[4] took the place of fingers on the frets and acted upon all three strings at once, thus producing the harmony known as organum.[5]
Representations
The organistrum appears on a
References
- ^ "www.organistrum.com -- Antonio Poves --". www.organistrum.com. Retrieved 2020-06-04.
- ISBN 978-1-136-76770-8.
- ^ "Organistrum". www.medieval-life-and-times.info. Retrieved 2020-06-04.
- ISBN 978-0-313-08368-6.
- ^ a b One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Schlesinger, Kathleen (1911). "Organistrum". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 20 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 268.
