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Lyra (i)
(Gk. lura).
The lyre of ancient Greece (it is classified as a chordophone). The Greek word lura was used in two ways in classical times: as a general term for any instrument of the lyre family (i.e. the Barbitos, chelys lyra, Kithara and Phorminx), and as the common name for one of the two kinds of lyre made from the shell of the tortoise (chelus), namely, the chelys lyra (the other being the barbitos, an instrument with longer arms). Lura is not found in Homer; the word first occurs in a fragment of Archilochus dating from the 7th century BCE. Lyres with tortoiseshell soundboxes first appear in paintings on Attic late Geometric period vases (late 8th and early 7th centuries), in scenes showing a lyre player among rows of dancers carrying leafy branches, men to one side, women to the other. Among the small lead votive objects of the 7th century discovered at Sparta are small lyre-playing figures, and one object representing a lyre alone is large enough to show the tortoiseshell markings and the remains of seven strings. Ivory or bone objects that may be plectra were found at the same site.
The Homeric hymn To Hermes (dating from the period c650–400 BCE) describes how the clever Hermes made the instrument from a mountain tortoise, cleaning out the shell, making holes in it for measured lengths of cane (?the bridge), stretching oxhide over it, fitting the arms in place and joining the crossbar to them, stretching the seven strings of sheep gut over it, and finally plucking them with the plectrum to try the instrument out. Vase paintings from 6th-century Athens and Corinth show the chelys lyra in scenes of processions, banquets, wine drinking, and dancing at wedding and victory celebrations. Theseus held the chelys lyra while celebrating with his companions his victory over the Minotaur (in 5th-century paintings he is rarely seen with the instrument, but centuries later the astronomer Hyginus reported that the constellation Lyra represents the lyra of Theseus, whose own constellation is nearby). Lyres were not used for funeral laments and do not ordinarily appear in such scenes, but in one painting a lyre player stands between two sirens, symbols of both music and death. In other vase paintings the lyre itself seems to symbolize these things: it hangs on the wall above a bed on which lies a shrouded figure, a bearded man with a wreath on his head; in another painting it is held by Nereids mourning over the body of Achilles. Later in the 5th century the lyre appears in other kinds of scene: a painting of a sacrificial procession, and a scene showing Paris interrupted in his solitary lyre playing by the three goddesses whose beauty he must judge.
Writers in the 5th century often mentioned the lyre in connection with schoolboys and their teachers, for the lyre also symbolized education. Singing to the lyre was thought to promote a sense of justice, moderation and courage. The instrument shown in schoolboy scenes on vase paintings is nearly always the chelys lyra; it also figures frequently in depictions of drinking parties, both the energetic kōmos (‘revel’) and the more sedate symposium. Women often played the chelys, as scenes of wedding preparations and other household occupations attest; but artists seldom chose to depict mortal women as lyre players until after about 475 BCE.
The image of the chelys lyra, easy to outline and to recognize, is often substituted for that of the other lyres in works of art, especially in small or sketchy representations; for example, it may take the place of the kithara or Thracian (Thamyras) kithara in various mythological scenes. In scenes of one type it is perhaps a metaphor for sudden death: Eos, winged goddess of dawn, seizes or pursues a youth (Tithonus or Cephalus); the youth struggling to elude her carries a lyre that may, as in earlier paintings, symbolize both his musical activities (as a schoolboy) and his death. The chelys lyra may also be a symbol of love and passion, for in many paintings Eros is shown playing the lyre. But in depictions of the Muses where each plays a different instrument (auloi, crotala, syrinx, barbitos and phorminx, as well as the chelys lyra), it is a symbol of creative inspiration.
Although kithara players often wore a distinctive costume, players of the chelys lyra had no special garb; in fact, male players, especially at a party, may have worn nothing at all, except perhaps a short cloak draped over their shoulders. In other contexts the player may have worn a long mantle wrapped around his chest and over his shoulder when standing, or around his lower body while sitting. Schoolboy musical contestants wore the long mantle and had wreaths of flowers or leaves (laurel or possibly olive) on their heads; those without wreaths may have had cloth fillets tied around their heads.
A player of the chelys lyra might perform while standing, sitting, reclining or walking, as the situation dictated; the instrument was held at an angle to the body, with the top tipped out, usually at an angle of approximately 30°. The method of playing the instrument was generally the same as that adopted by the kitharist (see Kithara). In most representations of actual playing, the performer is shown holding out the plectrum well beyond the strings, as though just completing a sweep of the strings with his right hand. The left-hand positions suggest that the player is using some fingers to dampen the strings or perhaps create harmonics (the points touched would be of no use in altering the basic pitches), or is using the thumb and sometimes another finger to pluck the strings. The artists seldom bothered to show explicitly that the player was singing, but it seems likely that the chelys lyra was used mostly to accompany singing or the playing of the auloi. Only a few vase paintings show the chelys lyra and any other instrument being played simultaneously; the auloi appear most often with the lyre, typically in processions or dance scenes.
When tuning the lyre, the player tested the sound by plucking the strings with his left hand. His right hand grasped one of the leather strips (kollopes) wrapped around the crossbar over which the strings were wound. Whether this procedure served simply to bring the strings into better tune, or whether it might also have been used to change strings to new pitches (i.e. to change harmoniai), is not known.
The chelys lyra was on average half as long (tall) again as the player’s forearm, elbow to second knuckle (even by this relative measure, the instruments played by children were unusually small), and usually a little over half as wide as it was tall; the taller the lyre, the less the width in relation to height. The soundbox seen in Athenian vase paintings is often not the round or oval shape of the natural tortoise shell; the shell was apparently cut away on both sides above and below the the area where the carapace is joined to the tortoise’s ‘belly’ shell, perhaps to imitate the shape of the skull of an animal with lyrate horns (from which lyres of earlier cultures known to the Greeks were made).
A thin hide over the underside of the shell (now the belly of the instrument) was pulled tight over the edge and held by cord or pins through holes in the edge of the carapace. The bridge, just below the centre of the soundbox, is often shown with feet that rest on the hide and are no doubt supported beneath it by the belly shell or by the lengths of cane mentioned above. The arms have a shape reminiscent of antelope horns, of which they may at one time have been made. They enter the soundbox through the hide at an angle, so that they lean forwards somewhat. At the crossbar the arms are partly cut away and a notch made in which the crossbar rests, with leather-and-pin kollopes around it to secure each string. At their lower end the strings are attached to a fastener similar to that of the kithara. The plectrum of horn used to strike them is attached to the base of the outer arm.
Representations of the chelys lyra in the 4th-century, although they are comparatively few and come from a wide geographical area (including eastern Greek settlements and Greek colonies in southern Italy), show that it continued to be constructed and used in much the same ways. In the Hellenistic and Roman periods the image of the chelys lyra can be found on coins and relief ware as well as in wall paintings, but it is seldom seen being played; the image may have been retained mainly as a symbol of music.
See also Lyre, §2.
Bibliography
W. Gundel: ‘Lyra’, Paulys Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, xiii/2 (Stuttgart, 1927), 2479–98
M. Wegner: Das Musikleben der Griechen (Berlin, 1949)
M. Wegner: Griechenland, Musikgeschichte in Bildern, ii/4 (Leipzig, 1964, 2/1970)
H.D. Roberts: ‘Reconstructing the Greek Tortoise-Shell Lyre’, World Archaeology, xii (1981), 303–12
M. Maas and J.M. Snyder: Stringed Instruments of Ancient Greece (New Haven, CT, 1989)
M.L. West: Ancient Greek Music (Oxford, 1992)
W. Anderson: Music and Musicians in Ancient Greece (Ithaca, NY, 1994)
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