Scan 126
The music and musical instruments of southern India and the Deccan, 1891
14 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 102. See the scan on archive.org.
1third and fourth strings of that instrument, though they pass over the finger-board, are seldom stopped, and such devices as shifts are absolutely unknown. There is likewise no method of tuning to any fixed standard of pitch. Willard, in speaking of this, makes the following observations:—"A drum or tabor, the sound of which is necessarily monotonous, is an ever attendant and inseparable companion to Indian songs, whether any instrument be present or not. Its sound is taken as the keynote, and all other instruments that may be present and the voice are regulated by it. From this it appears that as long as the use of the drum or tabor is not laid aside there will be no necessity for change of keys, and the rhythmical nature of Indian music renders a liberal use of the drum more essential, in order to mark the time distinctly, than any other accompaniment."4
3Many of our own instruments, such as are in use at the present day, have their prototypes still in existence in the East.
5The ancient Pâli and Sanskrit treatises would appear to contain the earliest reliable description of any musical instruments, and from these it seems clear that those of most Asiatic nations were originally derived from the same source.
7The Persians still use an instrument called quanūn, much like that of the same name found now in India—a kind of dulcimer, strung with gut or wire strings, and played upon by plectra fastened to the fingers of the performers. This is a development of the kattyayana-vina or shata-tantri (i.e., hundred-stringed) vina, as it was formerly called. This Persian quanūn, the prototype of the mediaeval psaltery, afterwards became the santir, which has strings of wire in place of gut, and is played with two sticks, and in the West it eventually took the form of the dulcimer. Hence the origin of the complicated pianoforte of the present day can thus be traced to the Aryans. And so with many others. The violin, the flute, the oboe, the guitar, all have an Eastern origin. One of the earliest stringed instruments was called "pinaka," and had one string twanged by the fingers; its invention is ascribed to the god Siva.
9The violin bow is claimed by the Hindus to have been invented by Râbana, King of Ceylon, who, according to tradition, lived five thousand years ago.
11The earliest instrument played with a bow was called râbanastra or râbanastrana. What this instrument was like is rather doubtful, but at the present time there exists in Ceylon a primitive instrument played with a bow, called "vinavah," which has two strings of different kinds: one made of a species of flax and the other of horsehair, which is the material also of the string of the
134 "A Treatise on the Music of Hindustan." Captain N. A. Willard. Calcutta, 1834.
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