Instruments of the World — Part 2: The Ancient World II — Egypt & Mesopotamia: Flutes, Sistra, and the Harps of Assyria

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Instruments of the World — Part 2: The Ancient World II — Egypt & Mesopotamia: Flutes, Sistra, and the Harps of Assyria The season's journey stays in the ancient world for its second sitting. Egypt completes her band: the long flute the hieroglyphs name Sebi, the little reed pipes with their straw tongues, and mam, the beloved double pipe; then the struck and shaken family — the bronze sistrum, the self-tuning drum, the square tambourine, the cymbals from a musician's coffin. Then the grid crosses the desert to Assyria, where the palace carvings of Nineveh keep a second nation's music: the great pillarless harp with its tuning tassels, walking in procession. And both valleys answer the season's standing question — who made it — the same way: no maker is named. Disclosure: this performance is narrated by AI-generated voices. Chapters: 0:35 — Introduction: The Ancient World Widens 4:11 — The Flute of Egypt 8:14 — The Single Pipe and the Double Pipe 13:35 — The Sistrum and the Rhythm Instruments 20:30 — The Harps of Assyria 30:35 — No Maker Named 34:08 — Close: To Greece and Rome The episode follows the season's recipe: what the instrument is, where it came from, who the record says made or perfected it, how it travelled, and what the collectors found. Period claims are voiced as the sources give them — attributed, with their doubts kept in the telling: the harp string-counts that will not agree, an estimate offered as an estimate. One strand is left out, and the register states it plainly: F. W. Galpin's essay "The Sumerian Harp of Ur" (1929) passes the season's date gate, but no open lawful copy of it could be located, so under the strict copy rule it is not used — the Assyrian harp material stands on Engel (1864), and the Sumerian harps' maker is stated as the passing sources leave him: unknown. The season's sources are public-domain works only, and no completeness is claimed for the episode or the season. Next in the season: Part 3 — The Ancient World III: Greece and Rome: aulos, lyre, and the water-organ. Music: opening and closing themes from "Before the Pines End"; background bed: "Gangster Piano Symphony", a quiet instrumental under the reading. Source: Carl Engel, The Music of the Most Ancient Nations (1864) — Internet Archive musicofmostancie00enge. Sir J. G. Wilkinson, Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians (1837) — Internet Archive mannerscustomsof02wilk_1. Carl Engel, Musical Instruments (1875) — Project Gutenberg #54537. KacheliTV — World Classics, Read Aloud.