Sambuca (instrument)
The sambuca (also sambute, sambiut, sambue, sambuque, or sambuke[1]) was an ancient stringed instrument of Asiatic origin. The term sambuca is also applied to a number of other instruments.
Original
The original sambuca is generally supposed to have been a small triangular
Eusebius wrote that the Troglodytae invented the sambuca,[4][5] while Athenaeus wrote that the writer Semus of Delos said that the first person who used the sambuca was Sibylla, and that the instrument derives its name from a man named Sambyx who invented it.[6] Athenaeus also wrote that Euphorion in his book on the Isthmian Games mentioned that Troglodytae used sambuca with four strings like the Parthians.[7] He also add that the Magadis was an ancient instrument, but that in latter times it was altered, and had the name also changed to that of the sambuca.[8]
The sambuca has been compared to the siege engine of the same name by some classical writers; Polybius likens it to a rope ladder; others describe it as boat-shaped. Among the musical instruments known, the Egyptian enanga best answers to these descriptions, which are doubtless responsible for the medieval drawings representing the sambuca as a kind of tambourine,[9] for Isidore of Seville elsewhere defines the symphonia as a tambourine.[3]
The sabka is mentioned in the Bible (
Other Instruments
During the Middle Ages the word "sambuca" was applied to:[3]
- a stringed instrument, about which little can be discovered
- a hurdy-gurdy, a hand-cranked stringed musical instrument from the Middle Ages, sometimes called a sambuca or sambuca rotata
- a wind instrument made from the wood of the elder tree(sambūcus).
In an old glossary article on vloyt (flute), the sambuca is said to be a kind of flute:[10]
Sambuca vel sambucus est quaedam arbor parva et mollis, unde haec sambuca est quaedam species symphoniae qui fit de illa arbore. |
sambuca ( Latin singular sambucus) are soft and pliant trees, and from the sambucus is named one of the symphonia family of instruments, which is made from [the wood of] these trees.
|
Isidore of Seville describes it in his Etymologiae as:[11]
Sambuca in musicis species est symphoniarum. Est enim genus ligni fragilis unde et tibiae componuntur. |
The sambuca is in the symphonia family of musical instruments. It is also a kind of softwood from which these pipes are made. |
In a glossary by Papias of Lombardy (c. 1053), first printed at
Sambuca, cytherae rusticae. |
Sambucas, simple harps. |
In Tristan und Isolde (bars 7563-72) when the knight is enumerating to King Marke all the instruments upon which he can play, the sambiut is the last mentioned:
Waz ist daz, lieber mann? |
What is this now, you free man? |
A
The great Boulogne
Fabio Colonna created the pentecontachordon, a keyboard instrument which he called a sambuca.[13][14]
References
- ^ Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, published 1913 by C. & G. Merriam Co.
- ^ Schlesinger 1911, p. 114 cites: Arist. Quint. Meib. ii. p. 101.
- ^ a b c d e f g Schlesinger 1911, p. 114.
- ^ Eusebius, Preparation of the Gospels, 10.6.1 - en
- ^ Eusebius, Preparation of the Gospels, 10.6.1
- ^ Athenaeus, Deipnosophists, 14.40
- ^ Athenaeus, Deipnosophists, 14.34
- ^ Athenaeus, Deipnosophists, 14.36
- ^ Schlesinger 1911, p. 114 notes: see Michael Praetorius (1618). Syntagma Musicum (in Latin). Wolfenbüttel. p. 248. and plate 42, where the illustration resembles a tambourine, but the description mentions strings, showing that the author himself was puzzled.
- ^ Schlesinger 1911, p. 114 cites: Fundgruben (in Latin). Vol. 1. p. 368.
- ^ Schlesinger 1911, p. 114 cites: Isidore of Seville. "20". Etymologiae (in Latin). Vol. 2.
- ^ Schlesinger 1911, p. 114 cites: MS Montpellier H110, fol. 212 v..
- ^ Colonna, Fabio (1618). La Sambuca lincea (in Italian). A. Forni.
- ^ "Colonna Fabio Linceo (1567-1650)". Musicologie (in French). Retrieved 2022-12-12.
- Attribution
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Schlesinger, Kathleen (1911). "Sambuca". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 23 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 114.
