MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS - online book

The History And Development Of Musical Instruments From The Earliest Times.

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	MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS.		09
	ance it was but little suitable. About a thousand years ago when this monochord was in use the musical scale was diatonic, with the excep­tion of the interval of the seventh, which was chromatic inasmuch as both b-flat and b-natural formed part of the scale. The notation on the receding page exhibits the com­pass as well as the order of in­tervals adhered to about the tenth century. This ought to be borne in mind in examining the representations of musical instruments transmitted to us from that period. As regards the wind instruments popular during the middle ages, some were of quaint form as well as of rude construction. The chorus, or choron, had either one or two tubes, as in the woodcut page 10 r. There were several varie­ties of this instrument j sometimes it was constructed with a bladder into which the tube is inserted; this kind of chorus resembled the bagpipe; another kind resembled the poongi of the Hindus, mentioned page 51. The name chorus was also applied to certain stringed instruments. One of these had much the form of the rithara, page 86. It appears however, probable that chorus or h 2

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