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Ibn Khurdādhbih on Musical Instruments
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
Extract
In an article written in 1926 on “Byzantine Musical Instruments in the Ninth Century” I mentioned that one of the earliest extant accounts in Arabic of the musical instruments of the Arabs and their neighbours is contained in an oration delivered by Ibn Khurdādhbih before Al-Mu'tamid (870–93). The narration appears in the Murūj al-dhahab of Al-Mas'ūdī (d. c. 956). Both of these writers were competent, to some extent, to deal with the question in its general aspect, and for that reason the recital has an added interest. Ibn Khurdādhbih had been taught music by the famous Isḥāq al-Mauṣilī (767–850), who was his father's personal friend. By his books, and by other means, some historical details of music and musicians were preserved, and they have been cited by later writers. Some of this information has, however, been challenged more than once by the author of the Kitāb al-aghānī, who censures Ibn Khurdādhbih for his mere conjectures, and for making statements without sufficient authority. Yet it may be presumed that the details given by Al-Mas'ūdī on the authority of Ibn Khurdādhbih may be trusted. The former, who had the highest opinion of the latter, would scarcely have quoted him at such length without reservations had he not approved. Al-Mas'ūdī was a great traveller and observer, and he had himself dealt with the music and musical instruments of the Arabs, Greeks, Byzantines, Syrians, Nabatseans, Indians, Persians, and others in his various works. If Ibn Khurdādhbih had erred, “the Imām of the historians,” as Ibn Khaldūn has called Al-Mas'ūdī, would assuredly have corrected him.
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References
page 509 note 1 JRAS. 1925, p. 299 et seq.
page 509 note 2 Al-Aghānī, i, 19; v, 3; vi, 16; viii, 13, 149, 162.
page 509 note 3 Al-Aghanī, ix, 58; xix, 133; xxi, 249. For details see Bibliotheca Geographorum Arabicorum, vi. Préface.
page 509 note 4 It is only fair to say that Ibn Khurdādhbih is sometimes quoted at second hand in this work.
page 509 note 5 Al-Mas'ūdī, Prairies d'or, i, 13.
page 510 note 1 Ibid., ii, 322.
page 510 note 2 He quotes a certain Fandurūs al-Rūmī, aa well aa writers on mathematics. Possibly, he also obtained information from Muḥammad ibn Mūsā ibn Shākir (d. 873).
page 510 note 3 viii, 88–99. There are also two oriental texts at least, Būlāq (a.h. 1283) and Cairo (a.h. 1303).
page 510 note 4 Encyclopœdia of Islām, ii, 398.
page 510 note 5 Al-Hilāl, xxviii, 214.
page 511 note 1 Ahlwardt, Verzeichnis, No. 8502Google Scholar.
page 511 note 2 The text haa Malik instead of Lamak, and Matūshalaḥ, the same as Abū'1-Fidā/. Barbier de Meynard has Matūshalakḥ.
page 511 note 3 Here follow details of the invention of the lute.
page 511 note 4 As the translation is not quite literal I give the text:
page 512 note 1 The Cairo text has 
.
page 512 note 2 The Paris and Cairo texts say “sixteen strings”.
page 512 note 3 The text has 
, but this interferes with the sense, and I have presumed that 
was written originally.
page 512 note 4 The text has 
.
page 512 note 6 The text has 
which is meaningless in any translation of the diacritical point. The Cairo edition has 
. I have adopted Barbier de Meynard's reading 
.
page 512 note 6 The text has 
, and the Cairo edition 
, instead of 
.
page 512 note 7 The Cairo text has 
in place of Tūbal.
page 512 note 8 Prairies d'or, viii, 417.
page 513 note 1 A MS. in the writer's possession.
page 513 note 2 Mafātīḥ, al-'ulūm, 237. Kosegarten, , Liber cantilenarum, 91Google Scholar.
page 513 note 3 Onomasticon, iv, 60.
page 513 note 4 Nūr-i Osmānīye MS. (Constantinople), No. 3651. Quoted by Yekta Bey in Lavignac's, Ency, de la musique, v, 2971Google Scholar. See also Bodleian MS., No. 1842, fol. 79 v, and British Museum MS., Or. 2361, fol. 173 v.
page 513 note 5 The Cairo text has thānī (
) in place of diyānay.
page 513 note 6 Kosegarten, , Lib. Cant., 101, 104Google Scholar.
page 513 note 7 Kiesewetter, , Musik der Araber, 92Google Scholar. Cf. Land, , Actes du sixième congrès international des orientalistes…, 1883, ii, p. 84Google Scholar.
page 514 note 1 Land, op. cit., ii, 163, 165. Cf. 84.
page 514 note 2 The Ikhwān al-Ṣafā' (Dieterici ed., ii, 311) give a plural suryānāt (
), and in another place (ii, 305) we have surtay (
), a singular in the midst of a number of plurals. The former word is identical in both the Cairo (a diacritical point missing) and Bombay editions, although the latter word is written surnāy. The word is given as surnāy in the Mafātiḥ al-'ulūm (p. 237), in the Shifā' of Ibn Sīnā (India Office MS., fol. 173), and in the treatise of Al-Ḥusain ibn Zaila (British Museum MS., Or. 2361, fol. 235). Strange to say, both the Būlāq (xvi, 138) and Sāsī (xvi, 133) editions of the Aghānī refer to a surnāb (
), and the word stands unconnected in the Taṣḥīḥ issued in 1917.
page 514 note 3 Rūm sometimes stood for Syria, as it was once part of the Byzantine Empire.
page 514 note 4 Athēnaios, iv, 78.
page 514 note 5 The Cairo text has 
for 
.
page 515 note 1 Beaussier, , Dict. pract. Arabe-Francais (1882)Google Scholar.
page 515 note 2 Madrid MS., No. 603.
page 515 note 3 Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayat (Būlāq, ed., a.h. 1275), ii, 450Google Scholar.
page 515 note 4 JRAS., Jan., 1926, p. 92.
page 515 note 5 Berlin MS., No. 5530 (Ahlwardt), fol. 25.
page 515 note 6 Ikhwān al-Ṣafā' (Bombay ed.), i, 98, 106.
page 515 note 7 Mafātiḥ al-'ulūm, 237.
page 515 note 8 Bodleian MS., Marsh 157, fol. 845. See also the Lisān al-'arab (thirteenth century), where the wanaj is said to be the mizhar or 'ūd. The Tāj al-'arūs (eighteenth century) includes the ṣanj and mi'zaf as well.
page 516 note 1 Al-Fīrūzābādī (d. 1414) in his Qāmūs mentions a qinnīn which he likens to a ṭunbūr.
page 516 note 2 ZDMG. xviii, 105. See Corp. Inscr. Semit., ii, No. 268. Cf. Mission archéologique en Arabie, by Jaussen, and Savignac, , p. 217Google Scholar.
page 516 note 3 Cf. JRAS., Jan. 1926, p. 92 et seq. Barbier de Meynard says that some MSS. give 
and 
. The Cairo text also gives urghanīn. Barbier de Meynard prefers ṣalinj (ṣilinj) although three of the MSS. consulted by him gave 
. Probably the word should be 
and it would thus be nearer the Byzantine Greek.
page 516 note 4 Also 
(Qandhurūs).
page 516 note 6 The account of the natures, attributed to Ziryāb (ninth century) in Al-Maqqarī's Nafḥ, al-ṭīb (Analectes, ii, 86, Moh. Dyn., ii, 119), is probably the correct formula, although the “compounds” of the elements are obviously wrong.
page 517 note 1 See my Influence of Music; from Arabic Sources for a lengthy treatment of this question.
page 517 note 2 This may refer to the thickness of the strings or to the accordatura.
page 517 note 3 Barbier de Meynard's text has dastabān and the Cairo text 
, but dastān is intended, although the word is probably derived from the Persian dast-band.
page 517 note 4 The musht on the lute served the double purpose-of bridge and tail-piece.
page 517 note 5 Bibl. Geog. Arab., viii. Ptolemy's Kitāb al-mūsīqī (perhaps the Harmonica) is not recorded by either Wenrich or Steinschneider, but it was certainly known to the Arabs, and is also mentioned by Rabbibi, Ibn 'Abd ('Iqd al-farīd, iii, 186)Google Scholar and Al-Maqqarī, , Analectes, ii, 87Google Scholar.
page 517 note 6 Hist. Anteislam., 82.
page 518 note 1 'Iqd al-farīd (Cairo, ed., a.h. 1305), iii, 186Google Scholar.
page 518 note 2 The three MSS. consulted by Barbier de Meynard, as well as the Cairo text, have 
. Al-Jāhiẓ (d. 864), however, gives kankala (Majmū'āt rasā'il, p. 80). Being a one-stringed instrument with a gourd sound-chest one is inclined to suggest that yaktāra (
) was intended.
page 518 note 3 Al-Muṭarrizī (d. 1213) also attributes the mi'zaf to the people of Al-Yaman (Lane, Lexicon). According to the Kitāb al-imtā' wa'l-intifā' this instrument was used in the time of the Prophet.
page 518 note 4 Bibl. Geog. Arab., vi, 68 of text.
page 518 note 5 Bibl. Geog. Arab., vi, 71.
page 518 note 6 Probably the ṭunbūr since it is referred to as having two strings.
page 518 note 7 Ibid., vi, 181.