The Sumerian Harp of Ur, c. 3500 B. C.

Author(s): F. W. Galpin
Source: Music & Letters, Vol. 10, No. 2 (Apr., 1929), pp. 108-123
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/726035
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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR, c. 3500 B.C

SYNOPSIS.
Introduction AS:uleriani Mlasical Instrumnents. 1. Thle Bow-shapedI
Harp. 2. The Sumierians. 3. The Development anzd Distribution of
the Harp. 4. Th1e Derivatives of the Bow-shaped Harp.

IN the year 1874 the British Associatioin for the Advancement of

Science, in conjunction with the Anthropological Inistitute, issued a
book of instructions for the guidance of explorers anid residents in
lands oversea, which should enable thenm to collect definite information
concerning the custoIms, arts and social life of little known peoples.
The importance of music and musical instruments in connection with
tllis line of research was brought prominently to their notice bv Carl
Engel, whose valuable labours in this direction had already attracted
the attentioln of ethnologists. Section 68, therefore, of the book was
devoted to music, vocal and instrumental, with questions as to native
scales, compositions, performances and traditions.
It is a matter for regret that, although half a century has elapsed
siince this laudable effort was made, the subject of music and
ethnology, at any rate in this country, is still considered a matter of
minor importance. With the exception of works like The Natural
History of the Musical Bow (Henry Balfour), The Precursors of the
Violin Family (K. Schlesinger), The World's Earliest Music
(Hermann Smith), the comparative study of the musical instruments
of the various races of mankind is a blank.
Now, however, the subjeet has been once more brouglht prominently
before us by the archaeological discoveries which have been made
during the past few years in the Near East and more especially in
that once mysterious land of Sumer, the biblical country of Slhinar,
the alluvial delta of the ' two rivers,' Euphrates and Tigris. As we
write, this lanid is day by day rapidly unveiling the riches and wonders
of her past under the experienced guidance of trainied explorers.
Without wishing in any way to mrinimise or undervalue the
researches of others in this cradle of the human race and the debt
we owe to them and to their fellow workers in N.W. India and

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 'THE SUMERIAX HARP OF UR 109

Southern Egypt for persistenit and patient labour, it is to the

recent excavationls in and arounid the great terraced temple of Naninar
at Ur in Mesopotamia (some 125 miles south-east of Babylon aild
about the same distance from the head of the Persian Gulf), to-day
a lofty artificial mound risinlg from the plain six miles from the
southern bank of the Euplhrates, that I wish to direct your attention.
Amid a wealth of gold and silver treasure of the highest craftmanship
and artistic design, have been and are being discovered repre-
sentations in engraved shell mosaic of the musical instruments used
by the Sumiierians in the fouirth millennium B.C., and, not only repre-
rentations, but the remains of actual instruments-the lyre and harp
which charmed the ears of a music-loving people five thousand years
ago. Prominenit anlongst them is the LYRE,(1) no loniger here in its
simple Semitic form, but elaborated by the skill of the Sumerian
luthier. The design is already familiar to us from the example
carved oni a bas-relief(2) found at Tell-Loli among the ruinls of the
palace of an early Sumeriani patesi or Governor, Gudea of Lagashi
(C. 2800 B.C.); but Mr. C. Leon(ard Woolley, to whomii we are chiefly
*adebted for the newv discoveries at Ur " of the Chaldees," has
enriched our knowledge of the instrumiilenit beyond all expectation.
Oni plate I will be seeni reproductionis frolmi the shell mosaies of
performers oni the 8-stringed anid 11-stringed lyre(3); the bodty of a
10-stringed instrum-1ent has also been found, the linles of the decayed
gut strings marked in the soil; and only a month or so ago three of

(1) It miiay be well at the outset to explain the raclical difference between
thle true lyre and the true harp, as the instrunments discovered at UiJ havie
hitlherto been alt classed as ' harps.' The Lyre has a somewlhat small and
shallow body or sound-box from eaclh end of which rises a post or armn joined
together again at the top by a cross-bar. The strings are usually attached
to the bottomi of the body and pass across the table or fronit of the souind-box
oiler a sh.llow bridge to tlhe cross-bar, wlhere they are tuined: iln mor e
developed examples they are fixed to a bridge bar on the table. The general
outline of the whole instruiment is rectanguilar. On the Harp, however, the
strings do niot lie .lelass the sound-box, but rise from it to a projectinig ariI
springing from one end of it; on this arm are the tuning pins. The general
ouitline of the harp is triangular; in Oriental and African instruments the
thiird side has, almost invariably, no structural completion, but in the Scan-
dinaviani or European harp a front support or pillar joins the top of thce
arm to the lower end of the body. There are, of course, occasional hybrids
created by the whim of the maker or the fancy of the artist; but in all the
hest forms the characteristic type is constailt. In the psaltery the sound-box
underlies the whole length of the strings across which they are stretched; the
outline of the sound-box or body, and therefore of the instrtumelnt, may varv
(onsiderably, but the player on the psaltery cannllot uise hiis hautd,s on bothi
sides of the strings as on the lyre and harp.
(2) cf. Ernest-de Sarzec. Decouvertes et (Chalhe, 1893, pl. 23.
(3) The inetlhod of fine tuning these lyres is very interesting, as it is also
found on many of the lyres of Greece and Ronie. After the strinig is drawn
roulnd the top bar at the approximate pitch, the end is twisted over a small
rod of wood: by pressing down the end of the rod the pitch is 'slightly raised;
by pressing it up it is flattened. This device is still used on the Abyssinian
lyre. See V. MaAillon, Cat. Brussels Conservatoire Museum, Vol. ITI., p. 87.
B. Ankermann, Die Afrikeaischen Musikinstrutne0te, p. 24.

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110 MUSIC AND LETTERS

these lyres were unearthed. I cannot do better than describe them

in Mr. Woolley's own words(4):

Of one the sounding-box was decorated with broa(l bands of

mosaic, the upright beams encrusted with shell, lapis lazuli and
red stone between bands of gold, the top bar plated with silver;
in front of the sounding-box was a magnificent head of a bearded
bull in gold, and below this shell plaques with designs picked out
in red and black. A second instrument of the same type was
entirely in silver relieved only by a simple inlay in white and
blue ani by shell plaques beneath the silver cow's head in front
of the sounding-box. Below these was found a third of a different
sort; the body, made of silver, was shaped rather like a boat with
a high stern to form the back upright; the front upright was sup.
ported by a silver statue of a stag nearly 2 ft. high, whose front
feet rest in a crook of the stem of a plant, made of copper, the
long arrow-like leaves of which rise up on each side level with
the horns.

And this is only the beginning of things!

Other instruments portrayed in shell are the SISTRUM and the
TABOR-DRUM. The former has been hailed as pre-eminently Egyptian
and due to commercial intercourse with that country; but, as will be
seen in the illustration on plate I, where it is held by a seated jackal, the
instrument is not of the ' stirrup ' or of the ' temple ' type so com-
monly found in ancient tombs and Egyptian paintings: it is a very early
'spur ' form which exists still in Abyssinia and has also been found in
the district of the Caucasus. An Egyptian specimen of c. 2500 B.C., with
a wooden frame was discovered at Assiut and is now in the Berlin
State Museum(5): it is not improbable that the then princes of Siut
were in close touch with Babylonian ways and wares, and Sumer after
all may be its original home. The rectangular tabor on the jackal's
knees is identical with the Arab De#(6) played to-day in the same way,
by tapping with the finger tips. No traces of wind instruments have
at present been revealed, but we trust that, with the great promise
before it, further research will yield examples of pipe and horn.

1. THz BOW-SHAPED HARP.

There is, however, one other instrument to which I wish to draw

special attention; at present it is unique, but at any moment other

(4) The Times January 22, 1929. As two uprights are mentioned in the
case of the thira instrument, I class it as a lyre.
(5) Curt Sachs: Die instrumente d. alten Aegypten, 1921. III. 51; see also
letterpress.
(b, cl. Alex. Christianowitech La Musique Arabe, 1863. Ill. I1.

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 PLATE I.

4 S~~~~~~~~~ ~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~'.' AL F_|

N CX

Fig. I. THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR (c.3500 B.C.)

a.b. Border and terminal plaque of soundboard (enlarged).

c.d. Section and contour of body (from existing indications and typical an-alogy.)

IFig. II. Lyre, Sistrum anid 1Tabor. Fig. 111. Lyre-player and Singer,

SUMERIAN MUSICIANS.

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 PLATE II.

101

9* ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 1

* ~~~13

15

THE BOW- SHAPED HARP

and its derivatives.

1. Bactrian Harp (c. 250 B.C.-25o A.D.) 2. Pompeian Harp (c. 79 A.D.) 3. Burmese Saun (modern)
4. Egyptian shoulder Harp (c. 3000 B.C.) 5. Egyptian upright Harp (C.2300 B.C.) 6. Egyptian
Harp (c. 1500 B.C.) 7. Adamaua Harp (WestCentral Africa). 8. Ombi (FanTribe, W. Central
Africa). THE ANGLE HARP. 9. Assyr-iain horizontal Hat-p (c. 650 B.C.) 10. Assyrian
upright Harp (c. 650 B.C.). 11. K'unlg-hiou (Chiina c.6oo A.D.) 12. Moorish Harp (c 1200 A.D.)
THE ORIENTAL PILLAR HARP. 13 14. Ostyak Harps (Western Siberia). 15 Cambodian (?)
JIarp (S.E. Asia)
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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 111

specimens may be forthcoming, and I hope they will, even though

they may differ in some respects from that already found. It is the
large HARtP found by Mr. Woolley in the arms of the girl musician
lying in the outer chamber of the tomb of Queen Shub-ad. It is
certainly the oldest harp now in existence, antedating thows of Egypt
of which the remains may be seen in many museums. The incidence
of its discovery and the clever way in which it was excavated and
preserved are so interesting that again we must quote Mr. Woolley's
graphic account given in The Times(7):

The first object found was a harp. There turned up a staff-head

of gold and then several copper nails with large gilt heads; careful
search disclosed a hole running down into the etarth from the side
of which nail-shafts projected into the void left by the decay of
the original wood. A stout wire was inserted and the hole filled
up with plaster of Paris, and thus a cast was made of what proved
to be the upright beam of the harp with the remaining (5) nails in
their correct positions; the beam was bound with gold below and
ended in a shoe of bitumen. The base of the instrument was boat-
shaped, of wood edged with a narrow band of gold and lapis lazuli,
and on it stood the sounding-box: this was of wood, also com-
pletely decayed, but its exact form was preserved by the inlaid
border of red, white and blue (hematite, shell and lapis) which
the hard soil had kept in place: it was a narrow box, rectangular
on three sides, but raking forward in front to end in a large calf's
head(8) of gold with top-knot and formally curled beard of lapis
lazuli, and shell and lapis eyes; below the beard the front of the
box was decorated with shell plaques engraved with mythological
scenes.

This harp is now preserved in the British Museum, but its

restoration has not been very happily conceived. Fortunately there
is no doubt as to the main details and approximate measurements,
but the lower portion of the body-apart from the sound-box-is
admittedly conjectural. A photograph of the Museum restoration,
together with a very interesting one of the process of excavation, will
be found in the Antiquaries Journal, noted above.(9) After a careful
comparison with other specimens of the bow-shaped harp-a type
well known and widely distributed, as will be shown below-I have
in the illustration on plate I shown the Sumerian example in its more

(7) The Times, Jan. 12, 1928: See also Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society,
July, 1928, and The Antiquaries Journal, Vol. VIII. Oct., 1928.
(8) The appearance of the figure of a bull or a bull's or calf's head on these
instruments is due to the fact that Nannar the popular Moon God and
patron of Ur, was callod the powerful bull or heifer of Anu God o
He is represented with crescent horn6 and a long flowing eard having the
colour of lapis lazuli.
(9) See also C. L. Woolley The Sumerians, 1928, p. 28.

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112 0 MUSIC AND LETTEtRS

likely and certainly more graceful form.('0) The

be seen, consists of a boat-shaped body and a l
271 inches in vertical length to the lower edge o
with nearly all the Oriental harps there is no fr
a much later addition, peculiar, though not enti
neck was without doubt originally inserted by a tenon into the
wooden body, the joint being strengthened with bitumen and encircled
by a band of gold. This method is borne out by more recent
specimens. The top of the neck is surmounted by a raised cap of
gold, which was at first taken to be a staff-head, but is similar to the
finials on the later Assyrian instruments. Into the neck are inserted
eleven copper ' pins ' with round heads: Mr. Woolley calls them
'keys,' by which I suppose is meant 'tuning pegs': but I think he
is more correct in describing them as ' nails,' for they do not pierce
the wooden neck like harp pins of the present day, and, although we
should like to regard them' as tuning pegs for the strings, it seems
to me that from their shape and the round flat head they were more
probably fixed in the wood and served as guides for the strings which
were wound round them and the neck to the tension required. This
was evidently the purpose of the wooden pegs observable in specimens
of the earlier Egyptian harps of this type (pl. II, 4) and it is not until
the eighteenth dynasty (c. 1500 B.C.) that we have an actual example
of a bow-shaped harp with tuning-pegs(11) in any modern sense
(pl. II, 6, Brit. Mus.). The Burmese harp (pl. II, 3) of the present
day, which is without these guides, is dependent solely upon hand
tension or on the raising of the string on the sloping neck: but in
Africa the string is often wound once round the neck, then looped over
itself and brought back to the pin: by drawing up or by loosening the
string on the pin the loop tightens or relaxes the string, at the same
time forming a rigid vibrating point or ' nut.' Most probably the
Sumerian harp was tuned in this way, the pins at the side instead
of at the back facilitating the arrangement.(12)
The body of the instrument is, like the lyre already mentioned, an
elaborated form of the more primitive shape (pl. II, 1); and although

(10) The photographs on this plate are reproduced with the permaission of
7he Director of the British Museum. Figs. II and III are from a 6hell
plaque on the supposed body of a lyre, and from the King's Standard
respectively.
(11) As will be seen I do not attach much importance to Wilk-inson's illus-
trations of very mcdern pegs with holes said to be shown in harps of the
3rd millennium B.C. at Beni-Hasan. See Sir J. G. Wilkinson, Manners anc
Customs of the Ancient E9gptians, 1837-41. Also C. Engel, Music of the
Alost Ancient Nations, p. 222.
(12) Even on the Egyptian harp of the eighteenth dynasty the strings could
not have been attached directly to the peg but some system of loop or nut
must have been used: for the pegs are at the back of the neck which, being
Rfat at the side, causes the strings to jar.

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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 113

in the Museum restoration it appears in two marked sections I do

not think that there was originally so great a distinction and for
this reason. Beneath the calf's head at the end of the upper part,
which is 273 inches in length by 83 inches in depth, there is a shell
plaque (pl. I, b) : as will be noticed it is not rectangular, but narrows
from 3 inches at the top to 2 inches at the bottom; this shows that the
upper part of the body was not parallel-sided, but had an inward
slope and this slope, I believe, was continued in the lower portion
of the body. Again, in the Museum restoration there is an awkward
gap between the ' shoe ' of the neck (as Mr. Woolley terms it) and
the upper part of the body: the greatest depth of this ' shoe ' is shown
by the line of gold and lapis inlay to be about 6 inches and the
width about 4 inches; the upper part, therefore, in order to be in line
with the lower, will be 4 inches in width at the ' shoe ' end and
2 inches, as previously stated, at the plaque end; and, owing to the out-
ward splay of the upper part, the top of the sound-box will be 5 inches
wide at one end and 3 inches at the other. It may be asked what
authority is there for this narrowing of the body? It is a long way
from Babylonia to Central Africa, but the bow-shaped harp is there,
and the specimen from the Adamaua district in the Kamerun shows
a similar rake of the body with the sides splayed as in its forerunner
and-as I hope to prove-its ancestor in the land of Sumer (pl. II, 7).
Although the ' table ' of the sound-board in African examples of the
present day is usually of stretched skin, yet ' tables ' of wood are
found and in the Sumerian harp it was certainly of wood, for the
lapping of the skin would have concealed the delicate inlay on the
upper edges.
The perpendicular rise of the upper part of the body where it
abuts on the ' shoe ' is not remarkable and has its counterpart in the
similar harps of ancient Egypt and in Africa of to-day (pl. II, 4, 8):
though somewhat pronounced it must be correct, as its height is
marked by the inlaid strip. The whole body with the ' shoe ' was
probably made of one piece of wood hollowed out within, as shown
in the cross section (pl. I, c), two blocks being left, one at each end,
to strengthen the thin upper part and afford attachment for the bar
of wood running beneath the ' table ' and to which the strings were
attached. There must also have been sound holes, if only to permit
the knotting of the string after it was passed through the small hole
in the ' table ' and ' bar.' As no vestige of wood remains, I have
placed them as in the Adamaua specimen (pl. I, d). The whole body
with its natural wood-perhaps of almug or red-sandal from India-
in the upper part and thini silver plates covering the lower part must
have formed, with its gold and inlay, an instrument worthy of a
queen's court. There is, at present, no representation of the instriu-

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114 MUSIC AND LETTERS

ment in the hands of the performer, b

the emblematic calf's head forward; it m
on the shoulder in procession (pl. II, 4),
tion by the side of the body of the play
either on a stand or on the lap, the neck
As shown, it is fitted with 11 strings: a
not only because no loose ' pin' would escape the eyes of Mr.
Woolley and his co-workers, but also because it is the correct number
for this type of harp, as I ahall presently show. We should like to
know the original pitch and tuning of this five thousand year old
instrument; yet whatever we may suggest will lay us open to contra-
diction as being the impossible: personally, I had no preconceived
idea of the scale, but by careful measurements of the vibrating
lengths of the strings from neck to sound-board I came to the conclusion
that the difference in length between the longest and shortest strings
(viz., 22 inches) could not in a course of eleven strings be referred
to the pentatonic scale so dearly beloved by our musical antiquaries
of fifty years ago. I then took the measurement of the string lengths
of an early and simple form of western diatonic harp, of which I knew
the correct tuning, and I found that the longest string of the Sumerian
harp corresponded with the string giving E below the bass stave and
the shortest with the eleventh string upwards sounding the note a on
the fifth line of the same stave. This gave a simple scale from
E to a of two disjunct tetrachords and a conjunct I tetrachord at
the upper end; -in fact, the sy8tema teleion or Perfect Scale in the
diatonic genus of Greek music. I must leave it there, only adding
that the same scale is still in use for the Saun-the Burmese bow-
shaped harp; the tuning of its 13 strings consists of two conjunct
tetrachords and one disjunct from B to et with an added A at the
bottom and an f' at the top of the scale.

2. THz SUMERIANS.

We may well ask, who are these Sumerians now standing in the
forefront of the musical history of the world? Who are these people
whose doings in peace and war are picturedfor us so realistically on their
mosaic inlays? Who are the men and women whose adornments in gold
and silver, wrought with consumnmate art, we can to-day handle and
admire? The answer is not easily given, for it is evident that when
they come before us in these early days of history revealed by the
recent discoveries in Babylonia- or, as we now call it, Iraq, they
appear as a civilised, industrious, art-loving nation. We see them,
in fact, at the zenith of their greatness and are permitted to witness

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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 115

its afterglow and decline: one day we hope the dawn will be disclosed
as archtuologist and ethnologist unfold their earliest story.
To this good end, shall not Music too lend her aid? Let me
begin by briefly stating some of the more recent opinions expres
concerning the origin and racial affinity of the Sumerians. It is,
I think, generally conceded that they-or, at any rate, their ruling
castes-were not the original inhabitants of the delta formed by the
Euphrates and Tigris. A very interesting and probable sketch of
the formation of this fertile tract of ' Sea Land,' as it was called,
has been given by Mr. Woolley(13) and it is clear that, until some sort
of lagoon was produced by the creation of a bar of silt across the
upper end of the Persian Gulf, the alluvial tract, known afterwards
as the Land of Sumer, must have been very slow in its extension.
The older and firmer soil seems to have been occupied by a Semitic
race and, although the Sumerians were naturally brought under strong
Semitic influence, they were not Semites. Nor were they ' Aryans '
from the north, for in othnic type and language they were quite
distinct. (14) There is, we are also told, ' no trace of any round
headed element of the Hittite type nor of a Mongolian type,' and
'one can still trace the ancient Sumerian face eastward among the
inhabitants of Afghanistan and Baluchistan until the Valley of the
Indus is reached-some 1,500 miles distant from Mesopotamia.'('5)
Again, in continuation of the foregoing racial clue, ' It is to the
Dravidian ethnic type of India that the ancient Sumerian bears most
resemblance . . . he was very like a Southern Hindu of the Dekkan
who still speaks Dravidian languages.'(16) From a close study, how-
ever, of the recently discovered mosaics I cannot but think that
upon this Dravidian element in the mass of the population there was
super-imposed a superior type with a long face, regular features and a
prominent straight or convex nose, and that it is- the original home
of this type we need to find, for to its possessors the culture of the
Sumerians was due. Reference has just been made to the Dravidian
speaking tribes of the Dekkan: they are various, but chief among
them are the Ghonds and the Koles. They originally inhabited the
N.W. Province of India, but owing to the pressure of nomad invaders
(the Aryans, for instance, about 2000 B.C.) were driven southward.
In connection with their primitive religious worship they hold dances
which centre around a national Ghond epic ' The Song of Lingal.'(17)

(13) C. L. Woolley, The 9Sumerians, p. 2, f.

(14) H. R. Hall, .4ncient History of the Near East, p. 173.
(15) Sir A. Keith, Al-Ubaid, pp. 116, 216.
(16) H. R. Hall, Near East, p. 173.
(17) cf. Stephen Hialop Papers relating to the aboriginal tribes of Central
India, 1866 (B.M. 10057.ee.4). Also J. F. Hewitt, The ruling Races (if
pTrehistorc tiLes, 1894.

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116 MUSIC AND LJETTERS

For these dances they use a musical bow deriv

and called Pinga to which is attached a sounding-gourd to increase
the resonance. This is the recognised origin of the bow-shaped harp
which we are considering, and the epic, in its first and oldest canto,
tells how a certain hero, named Lingal, who came to the Ghonds and
taught them agriculture and how to make fire, constructed from a
bamboo stick, inserted in a gourd, and a string of two twisted hairs
a musical instrument (jantur) with which he brought peace and unity
to the people amongst whom he lived. He made, moreover, eleven
sounds (naddang) to his instrument, and it is evident from the action
of the story that it was not the first occasion upon which Lingal had
found the power of music to soothe the savage breast. (18) To reach
this early home of the Dravidians, Lingal must have come
as their instructor and leader from the north, through one of those
passes between the western end of the Himalayas which have,
throughout the ages, proved the gateway to North-Western India.
Whence did he bring his knowledge of music and his instrument?
We go again to Central India and there we find two once-majestic
ruins-the topes, with their rails, at Sanchi and Amravati-the one
dating from about 250 B.c. and the other about 200 A.D. They are
buildings connected with the Buddhist religion and in their carvings
are frequent representations of the bow-shaped harp, some with eleven
strings (pl. II, 1). 9') But these sculptures and carvings are not in
the style and art of India. llsiian-tsang, who was travelling in
Central Asia and India in the earlier part of the seventh century
of our era, saw them, and described them as ' ornamented with all
the art of the Palaces of Baetria,' and an authority of our own, time
has confirmed this statement. (20) Moreover, the bow-shaped harp is
not a musical instrument of India: Hindustani music has no know-
ledge of it and it is stated that even Sanskrit treatises have no descrip-
tion of it; if they had, it would probably be classed, like other foreign
stringed instruments, as a Vina, which it certainly is not.
It is then to Bactria and Eastern Iran that we must look for the
home, first of all, of this harp, and although, owing to the desicca-
tion of Central Asia in more modern times, the cities of olden days
are now buried beneath the sand and once fertile valleys waterless,
yet on the sculptured stones of Eastern Turkestan(21) we find

(18) His personality was afterwards merged in that of the celestial musician
Narada (cf. A. H. Fox Strangways Music of Hindostan, 1914).
(19) Sculptures from the Amravati Tope, Brit. Museum.
(20) James Ferguson, Tree and Serpent Worship, 1873.
(21) Albert Gruienwedel, Alt-buddhistiskhe Kuzltsthtten in Chtinesisch-
Tutrkestan, 1912.

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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 117

representations of this type of harp and also that, by its passage

through Southern Tibet, it is still in use in Northern Burmah
(pl. II, 3): nay more, from its home in Turkestan it spread northward
to the Ugrian Ostyaks who added to it a front pillar (pl. II, 13, 14).
And who in those far off days lived in this part of the world? I quiote
Professor Langdon's concltusions :(22) ' All evidence suggests that a
dolichocephalic race speaking agglutinative langulaaes descended upon
Iran, Mesopotamia and the Persian Gulf, probably from their fertile
plains of Central Asia, before 5,000 B.C.' This wouild accouint for the
construction of the Sumerian language, which mueh resembles
agglutinative Tiurkish :(23) and if we class this race uinder such a
general heading as that called the Irano-Mediterran?c7a (a stock with
which, it is said, the Dravidians themselves were originally associated)
it gives us a dolichocephalic or narrow-headed people, with the long
face, regular features, light tawny skin, black wavy hair(24) and
prominent nose of the aristocratic Sumerian. At Astrabad in
Turkestan undoubtedly Sumerian treasure has been found, and I
cannot but conclude that the story of the comina of Lingal with his
klnowledge of agriculture, fire (the Sumerians were workers in copper)
and music, wa.s an attempt to visualise the dim tradition of the
arrival of the Stumerians from Eastern Tran into the Valley of the
Indus.(25) How long the newcomers stayed in these more pleasant
surroundings we cannot say: in the Punjab and in Sind they have
left traces of their art in the engraved figures of bulls and other
animals, buit not of their later written language (a form of cutneiform
derived, it is supposed, from Syria). Probably the pressure of fresh
adventurers from the north caused them to come southward down
the Indus Valley, sowing their grain with their pupils' help and
grazing their cattle, until they found an outlet westward, either
along the lowlands of Baluchistan and Southern Persia-to use modern
geographical terms-or possibly by coasting along those shores till

(22) Cambridge Ancient History, Vol. T, 1924.

(23) The cradle of the Turki race immediately bordered on this central plain.
They had a broad high head and there are some traces among the Sumerians
of their features, duie probably to intermarriage.
(24) The Sumerians were called ' black heads ' and their long wavy hair
was tied up at the back of the head in a small knob as shown on the
golden helmet of Prince Mes-Kalam-Dug found at Ur. Tfie face
clean shaven, but beards were also worn: at other timnes the whole head was
shaven and, unlike the Egyptian custom, not covered with a wig. The
Mediterranean race spread as far as the British Isles.
(25) I slhould like to see in the name Lingal the Suimerian word LJugal,
'great man,' and I believe philological laws are not against it. cf. Hind.
linga, lungara, lttjra, words of a cognate meaning. In later times the name
was linked with the procreative Linga worship so common in Tndia; but the
first canto of the old epic plainly rebuts such an association. The title,
Lugal, was adopted by several of the earlv Sumerian rules in the sense of
'King.'
Vol. X, B

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118 MUSIC AND LETTERS

they reached the head of the Persian Gulf.(26) With them no doubt
went the harp and Dravidians.

S. THE DEVELOPMENT AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE HARP.

We have already observed that the bow-shaped instrument found

at Ur is distinctly more elaborate and decorative than the simpler
forms of the homeland; it is evidently due to the applied skill and
experience of the men of Sumer. For instance, it will be noticed that,
compared with the Bactrian harp illustrated in pl. II, 1, the neck
is more upright, thus permitting the use of shorter strings for the
higher notes of the scale; it is fitted with pins or pegs at the side; the
neck is tenoned into the body and the whole highly ornamented.
Such an advance was not achieved in a moment and the instrument,
as brought by the Sumerian settlers, must have been a much less
developed form. Apparently we have proof of this and that the
harp, when its possessors first reached the Sea Land, had but few
strings. For research has shown that many of the Sumerians passed
on southward and, finding their way through Arabia, (27) probably
by the Al-Batin and Darvasir Valleys, then amply supplied with
water, to the southern end of the Red Sea, they crossed over the
narrow outlet and reached what was afterwards known as Upper or
Southern Egypt. For here we find, pictured on tomb and temple
walls or preserved in ancient graves, examples of this smaller bow-
shaped harp (pl. II, 4, 6). It will be noticed that the shape of the
earlier one is much nearer to that of the huinting bow, though it
has the raised soun(d-box, and that, on both of them, the pins or
pegs are at the back instead of at the side. It is now beyond doubt
that the predynastic Egyptians were indebted to the Sumerian
civilisation for their knowledge of art and handicraft. The Egyptian
tradition that Southern Arabia, ' The Holy Land,' as they called it,
was not only the abode of the gods but the source of their racial

(26) There was a very old tradition recorded by Berossos, a Babylonian

priest c. 275 B.C., that the arts of civilisation were brought to Southern
Mesopotamia by a man-fish, Oannes or Ea, who swam up the Persian Gulf.
This, however, need not imply that the Sunierians came by sea for to the
scared inhabitants of the delta the arrival of invaders via the lowlands
of the coast, inetead of through the mountain passes of the hinterland,
would suggest their coming ' out of the sea.'
(27) Reeent excavations ill the great Necropolis of the Island of Bahrein in
the Persian Gulf, off the coast of Arabia and about 400 miles south of Sumer,
have revealed pottery and portion of a carved bull with Sumerian charac-
teristics. A traw,eller in Southern Arabia met a desert tribe, the Al Miirra,
and says of them: ' The type of face reminded me of featuires to be seen
on early Sumerian sculptiures . . . they had the natural good manners
associated with old races.' Major R. E. Cheeseman, In Unknown Arabia,
1926. I have not observed any trace of the bow-shaped harp in Arabia,
but its derivative, the Jmtink, is there.

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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 119

progress, enshrines this truth(28) and, quite recently, it has been dis-
covered that the Badari of Upper Egypt, the oldest agriculturalists
of the Nile Valley, not only had affinities with the Dravidians of
India but knew also the use of copper, as the Sumerians did, though
the prehistoric Egyptians did not. In the twelftlh dynasty which
began about the year 2,600 B.C. we observe a remarkable elaboration
of the simpler instrument; it is, still bow-shaped without a front pillar,
but placed on a stand or on the ground when in use (pl. II, 5). This
development reached its highest pitch in the great harps of Thebes
with their elegant form and ilnumerous strings. Yet the simple
bow-shaped instrumiient remains still ill the southern part of the Nile
Valley, for in the five-stringed Nanga of Nuibia we have its counter-
part. Carried by Phlenician traders to the shores of Greece and
Italy it appeared as the vabila or nablinum(29) (pl. II, 2). More
interesting, however, is tlhe fact that it has travelled westward across
Africa, borne thither by Nilotic tribes under the pressure of invasion
and consequent rnigration. In the more distant provinces such as
Adamnaia and the Kameruln, we notice it with 6-10 strings and in
construction more like the earlier type (pl. II, 7). In the harp of the
Fan tribe (pl. II, 8) there is a peculiar extension of the body: to it
is now braced the curved neck, buit it appears to be a relic of the
time when the harp wa,s played with the neck resting against the
shoulder as in the Sumerian larp; the present African method of
holding the ordinary bow-shaped harp is with the neck forward
and away from the player as in the Bactrian harp. For the Kundi
or harlp of UJgand:i the stiell of a tortoise is generally used or its repre-
sentation in wood and a similar oval formed bo(ly has been observed
in o0l Egyptian examples, but in all specimens of the modern African
harp the tuning pegs are inserted into the side of the neck: these
side pegs-remliniseent again of the TLand of Sitinier-mark it off
from the ordinary stringed instrunments of Africa, suich as the popular
Semitic lyre known as the Kissar, which is gradually driving out the

(28) In the representation of the famiious fleet of Quieen Hatsliepsiit

(c. 1492 B.C.), figured on the walls of the tenmple at Mer el Balbri in Western
Thebes, one of the ships has a bow-shaped harp witlh three strings slung
on the cordage of the inainmast. As this voyage to the Holy Land and to
Puint was iunidertaken for peacefuil intercourise an(l trale, the hlarp may lhave
been hoisted as a signal of fr-iendship and affinit-y. For illustrations see
A. Duieiniehen The Fleet of an. Egyptian Queen, 1868. For- the fuller develop-
nent of the Egyptian harp see Sir J. G. Wilkinson Mlifnncrs moi (istomns of
the An7cien7t Egyptilans, 1837-41.
(9)9 The Hebrew- nebel, mnistranslated in the English Bible ' psaltery ' and
viol,' and in the Prayer Book ' lute.' The first meaning of the word is a
bottle, flask or basin, and it was applied to the bow-shaped harp owing
to its basin-like sound-box.

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120 MUSIC AND LETTERS

old harp; for those are without tuning pegs except in cases where
Turkish or Moorislh instruments have est-ablished themselves.-30)
As I have miientioned the bow-shaped harp of Uganda, I will draw
attention to a barbarous practice which was in voguLe amongst the
Baganda (as the people of Uganda are called) and had its couinter-
part also anlongst the Sumiierians. For the valuable and prolific
discoveries at Ur are due to a burial cult which happily (lied out
amongst civilised races long ages ago. It was, however, the custom
in the land of Sumer, upon the death of a King or Queen, to gather
the servants of the royal household, guards, horsemen, dancing girls,
even members of the harem, and to slay them in the open space
outside the royal tomb. The bodies were then laid arouind in order
with their weapons, carts drawn by asses or oxen (for the horse was
unknown), instruments of music and beautiful apparel, in order that
they might minister to the needs of their deceased master or mistress
in the shadowy and mysterious Bevond. I quote now from a descrip-
tion of the old burial customs in Uganda, performed only on the
death of a King or Queen :(31) ' When the hood (over the entrance
of the tomb) was let down to close it, the wives of the late King who
had been bound were placed at intervals round the tomb fronm the
left of the doorway onwards and were cluibbed to death: the men
mentioned above (viz., the chief cook, the chief brewer, the chief
herdsman, the keeper of the King's well and the chief in charge of the
sacred fire) were clubbed to death on the right side of the door; these
and hundreds more were killed and sent to attend upon the King,
who was supposed to need them in the other world. None of their
bodies were buried, but they were left where they fell around the
tomb.' And another point of similarity: amongst this African tribe
(the Baganda) there is a system of clans dating from an unknown
antiquity; one clan, claiming as their forefather the first King's
great friend who came to UJganda with him, is of lighter build than
the rest and its members have fine Roman features. This clan

(30! As is well known, the musical bow, that is, the how-shaped harp in
its first and simplest form, is in common u,se throcliouit the wlhole of Southerin
Africa below the Equator; in Nortlhein Africa it is uinknown, and between
the two the bow-shaped harp in its developed form is found in a wvell-defiined
but narrow streak of couintry from east to west. Owing to its peculiar
exelusiveness and manifest superiority over the primitive form I dlo not
consider that it. is indebted for its existence in Africa to the muisical bow of
the Soutlh. Tt is gradually disappearing udcder pressure from the east: in
UTganda tlte Biisoqa lyre (the Kissar) is occupying the ground. It appears
as though the use of thle archer's bow as a. musical instrument is co-mmon
to man whether in Africa, Asia or elsewlhere; btut the harp cannot be
classed among the primitives. The musical bow of Souith Africa seems
to have had its own line of development throuig;h the Wamr bee or Volga to
the Band,lj or Afiican psaltery, and they are all destitute of tutning pegs.
The triangular Kru harp, so popular around Sierra Leone, evidently owes
its origin to the otitside influience of another continent.
(31) Johr, Roscoe, The Bagavda, 1911, pp. 107 ff., p. 157.

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 THE SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 121

supplies the judge of the King's Court, wlho acts as his represen-
tative when absent from the capital. Could that forefather have had
Sumerian blood321 as Mwell as features? At any rate, it was the
degenerate strife of the clan system which laid the older nation at
the merey of its enemies and, towards the close of tlle third inil-
lenniUmI1 B.C., proved its downfall.

4. THE DERIVATIVES OF T1HE 0BoW-SHAPED HARP.

The story is soon told: we have already referred to the appearance

of the type in Greece and Italy. According to classical writers it
possessed from ten to twelve strinlgs and an instruinent described
by Athenteus bore a pailntiing on its body of the lotus flower of Egypt.
The speciinen figured in the fresco at Pompeii (pl. II, 2) hias, however,
onily five strings and small tuning pegs.
But another Oriental form wN-as to arise from this earlier harp and
it lhas been aptly called the angle-shaped or angle harp.(33) It Was
apparently first brought into general use by the Assyrians, a non-
Semitic race emiianating, it is niow thought, fronm Upper Syria. (34
Instead of a curved neck this harp has a wvooden or metal rod placed
at a right angle or even less to the body (pl. II, 9, 10). On the fine
instruments of the court musicians, so well depicted in the bas-reliefs
of the great Assyrian Empire (950-659 B.C.), there are no tuning
pegs, but the instrument was tuned either by hanid tension over
guiding pins, or by raising or lowering the attachment of the string on
the rod;(35) like the Burmese Saun, too, they show the tasselled ends
of the strings hanging downwards from their fastenings. There are
two markedly different types of the angle-harp: a smaller instru-
ioent (pl. II, 9) with the enid of the sound-box supported beneath the
left arm, as the Bactrian harp, and played like it with a large
plectrum held in the right hand. The upright rod or bar stands
away from the performer anid the whlole iinstrument is kept in place
by a strap over his shoulder.(36) In the larger form (pl. II, 10) the
body is held, not horizontally, but upwards in an almost vertical

(32) From the East African alcheological expedition we are learning. that
the earliest inhabitants of the district around the great lakes had Asiatio
cha.racteristics and not those of the present day African.
(33) C. Sachs, Real Lexikont, ' Winkeltypus,' s.v. Harfe.
(34) Sidney Smnith, Early History of Assyria, 1998.
(35) The little circles on the edge of the hocly -are probably the headcls of
pins fixing the skin ' table ' lap to the woodeti franme of the harp, and cer-
tainly not tuning pegs, as they are much more in number than the strings.
They may be, however, simply ornamental.
(36) This smaller instrument is )robably tfle sabka or sab)eca of Daniel,
cli. III, 5, so imisrendered ' sackbuV' in our English Version. From it was
derived the popular Trigon of classical times.

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122 MUSIC AND LJETTERS

position with the bar below; in playing it both hands are employed
as on the smaller harp, but there is no plectrum. This curious method
of carrying the instrument may have been found convenient for
processional use, but it is exactly opposite to the way in which the
large Egyptian harp was held, for there the bar or neck was always
uppermost (pl. II, 5). So conspicuous is this peculiarity that the
' Assyrian ' large harp is easily recognisable in widely distant areas.
It appears in Egypt shortly before or in the early part of the first
millennium B.C., as may be seen in a primitive wooden statuette
preserved in the British Museum, (37) where it has six strings and
guiding pins on the lower bar, or in a more elaborate specimen with
twenty-one strings and guiding pins, now in the Louvre at Paris.(38)
It has been observed in Asia Minor and in Greek art connected there-
with in the fifth century B.C. ;(39) it iS found in the rock sculptures of
Persia in the sixth century A.D. ;(40) in Northern China, where in the
seventh centuiry A .D. it was cornsidered a barbaric instrument and not
to be cultivated ;(41) in Korea as the Shiragi-Koto;(42) it is seen in the
ha.nds of a Moorish girl in a Seville MS. of the thirteenth century ;(43)
and in the representation of a Turkish lady dated 1583, by Melchior
Lorch. (44) It still has a precarious existence in the Arab Junk,
at corruption of the old Persian name Chank.
I do not, however, consider that we are indebted to this larger
angle-harp for the graceful shape of our own Northern or Scan-
dinavian harp, because it is evident that the latter was evolved from
an instrument which was held witlh the body or sound-box downward;
and we seem to have, at last, a positive link between it and the older
bow-shaped type in the harps of the Ostyak tribes of Western Siberia

(37) J. Stainer, 31usic of the Bible. Ed., 1914, plate 5. 1 have there sug-
gested that the Hebrew nebel-azor is a dialectical varianit of nlebel-ashor the
Assyrian ' harp.
(39) C. Engel, MJultsic of the most Anlcient Nations, p. 193. Surely this
harp, so frequtently illustrated, is always shown upside down; the tassels of
the strings should hang away from the bar and not lie over the instrument.
(39) Vase, 8015, Munich Museum: see Victoria and Albert Museum
Handbook.
(40) Robert Ker Porter, T'ravels in Georgia, Persia, &c., 1824.
(41) Illlustrations occur in and from the earlier centuries of our era: this
is from Ch'2ri shih uyo shit, in the Camhnridge University Library, by the cour-
tesy of the Rev. A. C. Moule see also The New China Review, Hong Kong,
1919. The illustration on pi. II, 15, is of a curious instrument, in the
Brussels Conservatoire of Mulsic TMluseum, described as Chinese (Cat. Vol. I,
p. 141). This can hardly be correct and M. Ernest Clof;son, the curator,
agrees that it nmay be from Cambodia- or Assam. It appears to he due to a
policy of despair, as the curved neck of the, bow-shaped harp is bent so far
forward that the strings cannot be tuned without the help of a supporting
rod.
(42) F. T. Piggott, The Music and Musical Instruments of Japan, 1893.
(43) Escorial Library, Madrid: cf. J. F. Riafo, Notes on Early Spanish
Music, 1887.
(44) C. Engel, Cat. S. Kensington Muiseum, 1872.

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 THE; SUMERIAN HARP OF UR 123

(pl. 11, 13, 14). 1 havle already alluded to the source from which it
is probable that they received their harp; apparently it came to them
without a froint pillar or suipport, for ve are assured that the instru-
rnent is complete without it,(45) Iand the small specimen (pl. II, 14),
now in the Asiatic Etthnographical Collection at the British Museum,
bears out this statement; for the froint support lias been ' sprunig in
as an afterthouglht aid tlhus prevents the emlpiloyment of tlle longest
string. The Finns, racially connected with the Ostyaks and coming
from Western Siberia inito Europe in the seventh century of our era,
brought this harp with them; it is stated that the last harper, who
did not use the front pillar, <lied in Estoniia about a century ago. (46)
It is to this migration, I believe, we owe the Northern type with its
fore pillar ;(47) like the Sumerian lharp it is the offspring of the bow-
shaped instrtuments of Bactria anid Iran and, permeating the whole
of Europe during the past thousand years, holds an honoured place
in the finest orchestras of to-day.
F. W. GALPIN.

To the further study of the history of the Near East as revealed

by most recent discoveries the following books are especially valuable
and well illustrated
H. R. Hall, The Ancient History of the Near East (Methuen) 7th Ed.
with addenda, 19,27: 21s.
Sidney Smith, The Early/ History of Assyria (Chatto, Winduis), 1928:
3ls. 6d.
V. Gordon Clildle, The Most, Anciient East, (Kegan Pail), 1928: 15s.
A. T,. Woolley, The Sanmervins (Oxford University Press), 1928: 6s. (A
most intei esting review of this special subject and tile htest issnecd.)

As this paper goes to press another ' harp ' has been- reported
withl a particularly finie calf's head, imiodelled in copper, and a
paniel of mosaic wzork wvith hum,aln figures in shell set against a back-
grotund of hapis lazuli, as on the woonderful harp foumid last year. . . .
We have practically finished ouir work in this part of the city.' C. L.
Woolley, The Timles, February 26, 1'929. Since this form of
Suimeriani decoration is common both-t to lyre and harp, there is noth
in the brief description to show the actual type of instrunment. It
probably a lyre.-F. W. G.

(45) C.. Sachs, i?eal Lexikot, s.v. Shotang. Illustration (pl. :I, 13) of
instrument in Hainburg Mlfuse,nr fii Volkerkunde, from C. Sachs Handbuch
dler Musikinstrutmentekun de, 1920.
(46) C. Engel, Music of the Most Ancient Nations. p. 34.
(47) For the subsequent development of the northern or Europeain harp see
H. Panum, Harp and L,re in Northern Europe, International Musical
Society Quarterly Magazine, Year VII, pt.1, 1905, and F. W. Galpin,
Old English Instrumetits of Mlusic, 1911. It must be remenibered that the
first three illustrations in Panum's paper are dated too early - Gerbert's
harp is from a drawing in a MS. of the 12th or 13th century; the MS.
Vespasian (Brit. Mus.) harp is on an inserted page of the 13th century; the
' Reliquiary of S. Mogue's ' harp is on the outter case made in the 11th century.

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