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The Rattle-drum and Marawe-Sistrum

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

Hans Hickmann
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Extract

In Egypt there is a very curious popular instrument. The rattledrum (“Rasseltrommel” in German, “tambour aux boules fouettantes” in French) has been considered up till now to be an instrument of purely Asiatic origin. The works of C. Sachs, A. Schaeffner, and Cl. Marcel-Dubois, illustrate its distribution everywhere in Asia. It is widely spread in India, Mongolia, China, Japan, and Korea. There is also a special variety in Tibet, as mentioned by A. Schaeffner (see plate xv). Yet it has not been pointed out that the instrument also occurs in Africa. In Egypt it must be a relatively recent importation, since it was unknown to the ancient Egyptians.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 82 , Issue 1-2 , April 1950 , pp. 2 - 6
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1950

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References

page 2 note 1 Geist und Werden der Musikinstrumente, Berlin, 1929Google Scholar.

page 2 note 2 Origine des Instruments de Musique, Paris, 1936Google Scholar.

page 2 note 3 Maroel-Dubois, Claude, Les Instruments de Musique de l'Inde Ancienne, Paris, 1941Google Scholar.

page 2 note 4 “. . . on either side hangs a lead ball attached to a string; the handle is rotated between the hands like a confectioner's whisk, except that the whisk is always held upside down, whereas the handle is held the right way up: and through this movement, which I have just described, the lead balls hanging from each side of the tloun-pounpan strike the two stretched skins” (A. Schaeffner, op. cit., p. 45).

page 3 note 1 C. Sachs, op. cit., p. 172.

page 3 note 2 Cl. Marcel-Dubois, op. cit., p. 67; and J. Grosset, “Inde: Histoire de la Musique depuia l'origine jusqu'á nos jours” (Lavignac, , Encyclopédie de la Musique, Paris, 1912, 1st partGoogle Scholar. The rattle-drum was used by mendicants in the Yaman (Niebuhr, , Beschreibung van Arabien, 1772, i, p. 146, plate xxvi, 5Google Scholar), and according to information given by a man from Aden to Dr. H. G. Farmer, it was called there the ṭabl al-faqīr. Thanks to another reference, which we also owe to Dr. H. G. Farmer, the same instrument is called in the Ḥijaz “daqdag (literally ‘clamour’), a name suspiciously like the Hindi ḍugḍuga, which was a similar instrument”.

page 4 note 1 Real-Lexikon der Musikinstrumente, Berlin, 1913Google Scholar.

page 4 note 2 A general view on the music of the Oriental Churches and the United Churches, represented in Egypt, has been given in: Hickmann, H., “Kirchenmusik in Ägypten” (Musik und Kirche, 17 (1947), 4–6, p. 162)Google Scholar.

page 5 note 1 Borde, La, Essai sur la musique ancienne et moderne (1780), i, p. 282Google Scholar; Villoteau, , Description de l'Egypte (Paris, 1809–1826), i, 1008–10, and plateGoogle Scholar; Bonanni, , Gabinetto armonico (1722), p. 127, plate lxxxixGoogle Scholar.

page 6 note 1 Ch. Daremberg—E. Saglio, Dic, op. cit.