news in March 1974 when they announced that they had deciphered the world's oldest song. What professors Richard L. Crocker, Anne D. Kilmer, and Robert R. Brown achieved was to read and actually play the musical notes written on a cuneiform tablet from circa 1800 B.C. , found at Ugarit on the Mediterranean coast (now in Syria).
"We always knew," the Berkeley team explained, "that there was music in the earlier Assyrio-Babylonian civilization, but until this deciphering we did not know that it had the same heptatonic-diatonic scale that is characteristic of contemporary Western music, and of Greek music of the first millennium B.C. " Until now it was thought that Western music originated in Greece; now it has been established that our music—as so much else of Western civilization—originated in Mesopotamia. This should not be surprising, for the Greek scholar Philo had already stated that the Mesopotamians were known to "seek worldwide harmony and unison through the musical tones."
There can be no doubt that music and song must also be claimed as a Sumerian "first." Indeed, Professor Crocker could play the ancient tune only by constructing a lyre like those which had been found in the ruins of Ur. Texts from the second millennium B.C. indicate the existence of musical "key numbers" and a coherent musical theory; and Professor Kilmer herself wrote earlier
(The Strings of Musical Instruments: Their Names, Numbers and Significance)
that many Sumerian hymnal texts had "what appear to be musical notations in the margins." "The Sumerians and their successors had a full musical life," she concluded. No wonder, then, that we find a great variety of musical instruments—as well as of singers and dancers performing—depicted on cylinder seals and clay tablets. (Fig. 20)
Fig. 20
Like so many other Sumerian achievements, music and song also originated in the temples. But, beginning in the service of the gods, these performing arts soon were also prevalent outside the temples. Employing the favorite Sumerian play on words, a popular saying commented on the fees charged by singers: "A singer whose voice is not sweet is a 'poor' singer indeed."
Many Sumerian love songs have been found; they were undoubtedly sung to musical accompaniment. Most touching, however, is a lullaby that a mother composed and sang to her sick child:
Come sleep, come sleep, come to my son.
Hurry sleep to my son;
Put to sleep his restless eyes....
You are in pain, my son;
I am troubled, I am struck dumb,
I gaze up to the stars.
The new moon shines down on your face;
Your shadow will shed tears for you.
Lie, lie in your sleep....
May the goddess of growth be your ally;
May you have an eloquent guardian in heaven;
May you achieve a reign of happy days....
Maya wife be your support;
Maya son be your future lot.
What is striking about such music and songs is not only the conclusion that Sumer was the source of Western music in structure and harmonic composition. No less significant is the fact that as we hear the music and read the poems, they do not sound strange or alien at all, even in their depth of feeling and their sentiments. Indeed, as we contemplate the great Sumerian civilization, we find that not only are
our
morals and
our
sense of justice,
our
laws and architecture and arts and technology rooted in Sumer, but the Sumerian institutions are so familiar, so close. At heart, it would seem, we are all Sumerians.
•
After excavating at Lagash, the archaeologist's spade uncovered Nippur, the onetime religious center of Sumer and Akkad. Of the 30,000 texts found there, many remain unstudied to this day. At Shuruppak, schoolhouses dating to the third millennium B.C. were found. At Ur, scholars found magnificent vases, jewelry, weapons, chariots, helmets made of gold, silver, copper, and bronze, the remains of a weaving factory, court records—and a towering
"We always knew," the Berkeley team explained, "that there was music in the earlier Assyrio-Babylonian civilization, but until this deciphering we did not know that it had the same heptatonic-diatonic scale that is characteristic of contemporary Western music, and of Greek music of the first millennium B.C. " Until now it was thought that Western music originated in Greece; now it has been established that our music—as so much else of Western civilization—originated in Mesopotamia. This should not be surprising, for the Greek scholar Philo had already stated that the Mesopotamians were known to "seek worldwide harmony and unison through the musical tones."
There can be no doubt that music and song must also be claimed as a Sumerian "first." Indeed, Professor Crocker could play the ancient tune only by constructing a lyre like those which had been found in the ruins of Ur. Texts from the second millennium B.C. indicate the existence of musical "key numbers" and a coherent musical theory; and Professor Kilmer herself wrote earlier
(The Strings of Musical Instruments: Their Names, Numbers and Significance)
that many Sumerian hymnal texts had "what appear to be musical notations in the margins." "The Sumerians and their successors had a full musical life," she concluded. No wonder, then, that we find a great variety of musical instruments—as well as of singers and dancers performing—depicted on cylinder seals and clay tablets. (Fig. 20)
Fig. 20
Like so many other Sumerian achievements, music and song also originated in the temples. But, beginning in the service of the gods, these performing arts soon were also prevalent outside the temples. Employing the favorite Sumerian play on words, a popular saying commented on the fees charged by singers: "A singer whose voice is not sweet is a 'poor' singer indeed."
Many Sumerian love songs have been found; they were undoubtedly sung to musical accompaniment. Most touching, however, is a lullaby that a mother composed and sang to her sick child:
Come sleep, come sleep, come to my son.
Hurry sleep to my son;
Put to sleep his restless eyes....
You are in pain, my son;
I am troubled, I am struck dumb,
I gaze up to the stars.
The new moon shines down on your face;
Your shadow will shed tears for you.
Lie, lie in your sleep....
May the goddess of growth be your ally;
May you have an eloquent guardian in heaven;
May you achieve a reign of happy days....
Maya wife be your support;
Maya son be your future lot.
What is striking about such music and songs is not only the conclusion that Sumer was the source of Western music in structure and harmonic composition. No less significant is the fact that as we hear the music and read the poems, they do not sound strange or alien at all, even in their depth of feeling and their sentiments. Indeed, as we contemplate the great Sumerian civilization, we find that not only are
our
morals and
our
sense of justice,
our
laws and architecture and arts and technology rooted in Sumer, but the Sumerian institutions are so familiar, so close. At heart, it would seem, we are all Sumerians.
•
After excavating at Lagash, the archaeologist's spade uncovered Nippur, the onetime religious center of Sumer and Akkad. Of the 30,000 texts found there, many remain unstudied to this day. At Shuruppak, schoolhouses dating to the third millennium B.C. were found. At Ur, scholars found magnificent vases, jewelry, weapons, chariots, helmets made of gold, silver, copper, and bronze, the remains of a weaving factory, court records—and a towering
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