Sounds, archaeological finds and scientific hypotheses all play major roles in an exhibition entitled "Sounds of Ancient Music," which opened last week at the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem. Focusing on musical developments in ancient Sumeria, Babylon, Assyria and other cultures of the Ancient Near East, through the periods of the Kingdom of Judea, Greece and the Roman Empire, the exhibition features 137 objects - among them, rare musical instruments that have been preserved from antiquity, as well as full-sized replicas of instruments from those early eras.
Among other items on display are a flute, fragments of which were discovered in a burial cave in the French Hill neighborhood of Jerusalem and dating back to the Second Temple period, as well as the well-known stone from that same period bearing the inscription, "To the House of Trumpeting to the k ...," in a form of the Hebrew alphabet typical of the Herodian period. According to scholars, this was part of the southwestern cornerstone of the Temple compound described by the first-century C.E. Jewish historian Josephus, from which a kohen (priest) blew the trumpet to usher in the Sabbath. According to the Mishna, in those days people blew trumpets, strummed harps and lyres, played the flute and beat the cymbal. It is written that the sounds of the flute and the cymbal were so loud they could be heard even in Jericho.
Visitors to the exhibition are invited to listen to a trumpet being blown the way the researchers believe it sounded in the courtyard of the Temple. There are also earlier finds on hand - for example, a flute from the Chalcolithic period (the Copper Age, 4,300-3,300 B.C.E.), one of the oldest wind instruments discovered in all of the Near East. Leaping over thousands of years, there is also on display a rare silver bowl adorned with a figure of Eros playing musical instruments such as the kithara (from the Roman period, end of the second century C.E.).
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The curators of the Bible Lands exhibition stress the varied role that music played in ancient times: as a means for singing praises to the king, as a form of "therapy" (as in David's relationship with Saul), as moral and spiritual encouragement at work and in hunting. In ancient Greece there were also contests in instrumental music and singing, along with athletic competitions. Plato emphasized that musical education was a necessary element in developing a balanced character, and wrote in The Republic that those who become addicted only to gymnastics end up being too wild, whereas those interested only in music are softer than they ought to be.
One of the most impressive early texts, which is cited in the explanatory material presented in the exhibition, is a document in which King Shulgi of Ur (Mesopotamia, third century B.C.E.), boasts of his musical talents: "I, Shulgi, king of Ur, have also devoted myself to music. Nothing is too complicated for me; I know the full extent of the tigi-drum and adab-drum, the perfection of the art of music. When I fix the frets on the lute, which enraptures my heart, I never damage its neck; I have devised rules for raising and lowering its intervals. On the gu-us-lyre, I know the melodious tuning. I am familiar with the sa-es and with drumming on its musical soundbox" (Shulgi B 154-162).
Multimedia stations have been set up in the museum so as to enable visitors to virtually "play" such ancient instruments as the lyre, the flute and drums. Dozens of digital music players provide an audio guide in Hebrew and English with a highlight tour of the exhibition, peppered with the musical interludes based on the sounds of ancient instruments.
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