Download or read book The Manual of Harmonics of Nicomachus the Pythagorean written by Nicomachus (of Gerasa.) and published by Red Wheel/Weiser. This book was released on 1994-01-01 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In ancient Greek thought, the musical scale discovered by the philosopher Pythagoras was seen as a utopian model of the harmonic order behind the structure of the cosmos and human existence. Through proportion and harmony, the musical scale bridges the gap between two extremes. It encapsulates the most fundamental pattern of harmonic symmetry and demonstrates how the phenomena of nature are inseparably related to one another through the principle of reciprocity. Because of these relationships embodied in its structure, the musical scale was seen as an ideal metaphor of human society by Plato and other Pythagorean thinkers, for it is based on the cosmic principles of harmony, reciprocity, and proportion, whereby each part of the whole receives its just and proper share. This book is the first ever complete translation of The Manual of Harmonics by the Pythagorean philosopher Nicomachus of Gerasa (second century A.D.) published with a comprehensive, chapter-by-chapter commentary. It is a concise and well-organized introduction to the study of harmonics, the universal principles of relation embodied in the musical scale. Also included is a remarkable chapter-by-chapter commentary by the translator, Flora Levin, which makes this work easily accessible to the reader today. Dr. Levin explains the principles of Pythagorean harmony, provides extensive background information, and helps to situate Nicomachus' thought in the history of ideas. This important work constitutes a valuable resource for all students of ancient philosophy, Western cosmology, and the history of music.
Download or read book Measuring Heaven written by Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-05 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Surviving fragments of information about Pythagoras (born ca. 570 BCE) gave rise to a growing set of legends about this famous sage and his followers, whose reputations throughout Antiquity and the Middle Ages have never before been studied systematically. This book is the first to examine the unified concepts of harmony, proportion, form, and order that were attributed to Pythagoras in the millennium after his death and the important developments to which they led in art, architecture, mathematics, astronomy, music, medicine, morals, religion, law, alchemy, and the occult sciences. In this profusely illustrated book, Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier sets out the panorama of Pythagoras's influence and that of Christian and Jewish thinkers who followed his ideas in the Greek, Roman, early Christian, and medieval worlds. In illuminating this tradition of thought, Joost-Gaugier shows how the influence of Pythagoreanism was far broader than is usually realized, and that it affected the development of ancient and medieval art and architecture from Greek and Roman temples to Gothic cathedrals.Joost-Gaugier demonstrates that Pythagoreanism—centered on the dim memory of a single person that endured for centuries and grew ever-greater—inspired a new language for artists and architects, enabling them to be "modern."
Download or read book Apollo s Lyre written by Thomas J. Mathiesen and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 1999-01-01 with total page 832 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ancient Greek music and music theory has fascinated scholars for centuries not only because of its intrinsic interest as a part of ancient Greek culture but also because the Greeks? grand concept of music has continued to stimulate musical imaginations to the present day. Unlike earlier treatments of the subject, Apollo?s Lyre is aimedøprincipally at the reader interested in the musical typologies, the musical instruments, and especially the historical development of music theory and its transmission through the Middle Ages. The basic method and scope of the study are set out in a preliminary chapter, followed by two chapters concentrating on the role of music in Greek society, musical typology, organology, and performance practice. The next chapters are devoted to the music theory itself, as it developed in three stages: in the treatises of Aristoxenus and the Sectio canonis; during the period of revival in the second century C.E.; and in late antiquity. Each theorist and treatise is considered separately but always within the context of the emerging traditions. The theory provides a remarkably complete and coherent system for explaining and analyzing musical phenomena, and a great deal of its conceptual framework, as well as much of its terminology, was borrowed and adapted by medieval Latin, Byzantine, and Arabic music theorists, a legacy reviewed in the final chapter. Transcriptions and analyses of some of the more complete pieces of Greek music preserved on papyrus or stone, or in manuscript, are integrated with a consideration of the musicopoetic types themselves. The book concludes with a comprehensive bibliography for the field, updating and expanding the author?s earlier Bibliography of Sources for the Study of Ancient Greek Music.
Download or read book Alexandria 2 written by David Fideler and published by Red Wheel/Weiser. This book was released on 1993-01-01 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Journal of cosmology, philosophy, myth, and culture.
Download or read book A General History of the Science and Practice of Music written by John Hawkins and published by . This book was released on 1868 with total page 540 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Greek Reflections on the Nature of Music written by Flora R. Levin and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2009-04-27 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, Flora Levin explores how and why music was so important to the ancient Greeks. She examines the distinctions that they drew between the theory of music as an art ruled by number and the theory wherein number is held to be ruled by the art of music. These perspectives generated more expansive theories, particularly the idea that the cosmos is a mirror-image of music's structural elements and, conversely, that music by virtue of its cosmic elements - time, motion, and the continuum - is itself a mirror-image of the cosmos. These opposing perspectives gave rise to two opposing schools of thought, the Pythagorean and the Aristoxenian. Levin argues that the clash between these two schools could never be reconciled because the inherent conflict arises from two different worlds of mathematics. Her book shows how the Greeks' appreciation of the profundity of music's interconnections with philosophy, mathematics, and logic led to groundbreaking intellectual achievements that no civilization has ever matched.
Download or read book Music and Ideas in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries written by Claude V. Palisca and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 2010-10-01 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This essential summation of Palisca's life work was nearly finished by his death in 2001, and it was brought to completion by Thomas J. Mathiesen.
Download or read book Byzantine Military Manuals as Literary Works and Practical Handbooks written by Georgios Chatzelis and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-01-22 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book studies the Sylloge Tacticorum, an important tenth-century Byzantine military manual. The text is used as a case study to connect military manuals with the challenges that Byzantium faced in its wars with the Arabs, but also with other aspects of Byzantine society such as education, politics, and conventions in the productions of literary texts and historical narratives. The book explores when the Sylloge was written and by whom. It identifies which passages from classical or earlier works were incorporated in the Sylloge and explains the reason why Byzantines imitated works of the past. The book then studies the extent to which the Sylloge was original and how innovation and originality were received in Byzantine society. Despite the imitation, the author of the Sylloge adapted and updated his material to reflect the current operational needs as well as the ideological, cultural and religious context of his time. Finally, the book attempts to estimate the extent to which Byzantine generals followed the advice of military manuals, and to explore whether historical narratives can be safely used to draw information as to how the Byzantines and the Arabs fought. Therefore, along with a detailed study of the Sylloge Tacticorum, this monograph also addresses broader issues of the pen and the sword such as military manuals in connection with Byzantine warfare, politics, literature, historiography and education.
Download or read book Pythagoras written by Thomas Stanley and published by Nicolas-Hays, Inc.. This book was released on 2010-05-01 with total page 357 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The timeless brilliance of this exhaustive survey of the best classical writers of antiquity on Pythagoras was first published in 1687 in Thomas Stanley’s massive tome, The History of Philosophy. It remains as contemporary today as it was over three hundred years ago. The text of the 1687 book has been reset and modernized to make it more accessible to the modern reader. Spelling has been regularized, obsolete words not found in a modern dictionary have been replaced, and contemporary conventions of punctuation have been used. Biographical sketches of Thomas Stanley and Pythagoras by Manly Palmer Hall, founder of the Philosophical Research Society, have been included, along with a profound overview of Pythagorean philosophy by Platonic scholar Dr. Henry L. Drake. The extensive Greek language references throughout the text have been corrected and contextualized, and reset in a modern Greek font. Each quotation has been verified with the source document in Greek. An extensive annotated appendix of these classical sources is included. A complete bibliography details all the reference works utilized, and a small Glossary defines a number of terms, especially those from musical theory, which may be unfamiliar to the non-technical reader.
Download or read book Aquinas on Beauty written by Christopher Scott Sevier and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2015-02-12 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aquinas on Beauty explores the nature and role of beauty in the thought of Thomas Aquinas. Beginning with a standard definition of beauty provided by Aquinas, it explores each of the components of that definition. The result is a comprehensive account of Aquinas’s formal view on the subject, supplemented by an exploration into Aquinas’s commentary on Dionysius’s Divine Names, including a comparison of his views with those of both Dionysius and those of Aquinas’s mentor, Albert the Great. The book also highlights the tight connection in Aquinas’s thought between aesthetics and ethics, and illustrates how Aquinas preserves what is best about aesthetic traditions preceding him, and anticipates what is best about aesthetic traditions that would follow, marrying objective and subjective aesthetic intuitions and charting a kind of via media between the common extremes.
Download or read book Introduction to Arithmetic written by Nicomachus (of Gerasa.) and published by . This book was released on 1926 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A New History of Greek Mathematics written by Reviel Netz and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-09 with total page 541 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Engaging and comprehensive history of Greek mathematics, with full attention to social contexts and its place in world history.
Download or read book Divine Harmony written by John Strohmeier and published by . This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Divine Harmony describes Pythagoras's wanderings in ancient Phoenicia, Egypt, Babylon, and Greece, and explores key Pythagorean ideas as taught at his scholarly community in southern Italy. This fascinating study of the sixth-century Greek scientist and mystic includes illustrations, a map, a new introduction, and an updated bibliography. Drawing on the writings of Pythagoras's disciples, the authors present a lively portrait of a man whose ideas continue to resonate.
Download or read book The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory written by Thomas Christensen and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-04-20 with total page 1033 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory is the first comprehensive history of Western music theory to be published in the English language. A collaborative project by leading music theorists and historians, the volume traces the rich panorama of music-theoretical thought from the Ancient Greeks to the present day. Recognizing the variety and complexity of music theory as an historical subject, the volume has been organized within a flexible framework. Some chapters are defined chronologically within a restricted historical domain, whilst others are defined conceptually and span longer historical periods. Together the thirty-one chapters present a synthetic overview of the fascinating and complex subject that is historical music theory. Richly enhanced with illustrations, graphics, examples and cross-citations as well as being thoroughly indexed and supplemented by comprehensive bibliographies of the most important primary and secondary literature, this book will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars alike.
Download or read book Horns Strings and Harmony written by Arthur H. Benade and published by Courier Corporation. This book was released on 2014-05-05 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Engaging, accessible introduction to structure and sound-making capacities of piano, violin, trumpet, bugle, oboe, flute, saxophone, many other instruments. Also, how to build your own trumpet, flute, clarinet. Includes 76 illustrations. Bibliography.
Download or read book Aristoxenus s Ghost written by Mitzi DeWhitt and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2004-09-07 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As Vyasa, scribe of the epic Mahabarata, said, This book is about you. At first glance the material may seem to be about the specter of ancient Greek musical theory, the ghostly remains that concern a musical system long past and forgotten. However, first glances are often very deceiving. What is offered within its pages goes far beyond arid musical theorizing. As the reader soon begins to discover, permeating through-and-through, in every word on every page, is the archetypal portrait of the ever-present Self. The original and revelatory information, overflowing with meaning, emerges into the world-at-large not only from the extensive research that comes from books and libraries and institutions of higher learning, but also from the deep, quiet, inner searching for the soul. The ideas are unquestionably rich in the nutrients that feed the mind, while also nourishing the heart. Assimilating their message cannot help but inform and transform the reader. Utilizing simple but irrefutable musical mathematics, the author deftly erases centuries-long misunderstandings and speculations by bringing to light what has been lost for twenty-five hundred years: the enharmonic genus. Her point of departure is the Greek musician, Aristoxenus [c. 360 B. C.], a pupil of the philosopher Aristotle. Aristoxenus, the son of a musician, penned a seven-part treatise about music, called Elementa Harmonica. Harmonics was the science concerned with the laws of world creation and world maintenance: how they came into existence and how they were organized. Harmonics revealed the fundamental blueprint of creation, and subsequent theoretical structures. The Elementa Harmonica is considered the oldest theory text still in existence. Its influence was considerable and its theoretical ideas were passed on as doctrine by musical theorist of antiquity. Even so, much of what Aristoxenus wrote in Elementa Harmonica has been lost. Of its last three sections (Modes, Modulation, and Construction) very little remains, while the first four categories (Genera, Intervals, Notes, and Systems) continue to be the basis for heated controversy and endless confusion among scholars. The perplexities are immediately cleared up by the recovery of the enharmonic genus. Suddenly, with discovery of the long lost key, we are able to read the basic blueprint, or matrix, that reveals the universal laws. What today we call the matrix, the ancient Greeks named the katapyknosis. From the shifts within the matrix structure comes the organization of the ancient Harmonia, a word that means soul. Harmonics is really about the soul: of what it is composed, and how it is made. Being the reconciling factor, the soul integrates the inner and outer octaves, enabling the image-formation that is uniquely human. By the measure of the soul one is able to view both the world and oneself objectively. Taking a more intuitive approach than what is permitted in academia, the author describes how Aristoxenuss seven musical categories, beginning with the key of the recovered enharmonic genus, actually reveal the expanded viewpoint of an underlying hermetic tradition, one effectively preserved and transmitted by the very information contained within Elementa Harmonica itself. The bold and innovative interpretations in this work may, in all likelihood, set off a storm of controversy that will go beyond the confines of the academic community. What has been dared is the revivifying of ideas, long considered cold and dead, so they once again vibrate the eternal truths of physical and metaphysical principles. Uniquely original yet universal, crossing the lines of science and religion and philosophy, the information emerges into the world-at-large just in the nick of time, as the world approaches the brink of an abyss that cannot be bridged by the usual attempts at diplo
Download or read book Music and Esotericism written by Laurence Wuidar and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010-05-15 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book analyzes the relationships that exist between esotericism and music from Antiquity to the 20th century, investigating ways in which magic, astrology, alchemy, divination, and cabbala interact with music. Ce livre offre un panorama des relations entre l’ésotérisme et la musique de l’Antiquité au 20ème siècle et montre comment la magie, l’astrologie, l’alchimie, la divination et la cabale interagissent avec l’art et la science des sons.
