Department of the Classics, Harvard University

An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music

Author(s): Robert W. Wallace
Source: Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, Vol. 101 (2003), pp. 73-92
Published by: Department of the Classics, Harvard University
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3658525 .
Accessed: 09/02/2011 04:22

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless
you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you
may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at .
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=dchu. .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed
page of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Department of the Classics, Harvard University is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.

http://www.jstor.org
 AN EARLYFIFTH-CENTURYATHENIAN
REVOLUTIONIN AULOS MUSIC

ROBERTW. WALLACE

to recover one piece of informa-

AFTER thea brief opening section
reconstructseveral devel-
tion, following pages revolutionary
opments in the use of the aulos for music researchand social playing in
early fifth-centuryAthens, and the reaction against these developments
thatbegan aroundmid-century.'

(A) LAMPROCLESTHE ATHLETE(?)

According to the scholia vetera to Ar. Clouds 967, Eratosthenes

reported that the poem including the words i•6,oaxa nrepa~tnotv
88etvv OEbov ~ypEsiC8oLtgov (partlyquoted in Clouds by Dikaios Logos)
was attributedby Phrynichusto the work of AagtnpoicXio;
roo &OX71rl-
toi, Mi•[vo; iioi (i E(2)).2 This description of Lampro-
~a•o~TlroI
cles is quoted twice by Holwerda, again by Koster,and also by Page.3
1 Thanksto PeterWilson, TimothyMoore, HSCP's editor,and its excellent readersfor

comments on this text. Rich in ideas and also bibliography,Peter Wilson's essay "The
aulos in Athens," in The Performance Culture of Athenian Democracy, ed. S. Goldhill
and R. Osborne(Cambridge1999) 58-95, is in many respects complementaryto the pre-
sent discussion. I am gratefulto its authorfor sending me an advancecopy.
2 Is this Phrynichus the comic poet? So, e.g., B. F. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt, The
OxyrhynchusPapyri XIII (London 1919) 146, and K. J. Dover, Aristophanes Clouds
(Oxford 1968) 215 ad loc.
3 D. Holwerda, "De novo Chamaeleontis studiorum testimonio," Mnemosyne iv 5
(1952) 230 n. 2 (the Peripatetic Chamaeleon knew of a different tradition about this
poem: see next note) and Prolegomena de comoedia scholia in Acharnenses, Equites,
Nubes, Fasc. 3. 1 (Groningen 1977) 185 ad loc.; W. J. W. Koster, "Ecce iterum
Chamaeleon,"Mnemosyne iv 6 (1953) 63; Page PMG no. 735. On the tendency of
ancient biographicaltraditionsto confuse fathers and teachers (including our example of
Lamprocles' Midon), see L. Lehnus, "Scopelino 'padre' di Pindaro,"Rend. Ist. Lomb.
111 (1977) 78-82. Nothing else is known aboutMidon.
74 RobertW Wallace

Dover duly attributesthe figure "Lamproklesthe athlete"to YE(2)(3)in

his edition of Clouds.4
Three other reportsare transmittedabout Lamprocles,in additionto
Clouds' implicationthat the poem quoted by Dikaios Logos belongs to
or before the Marathonianperiod. First, Athenaeus 491c calls him
dithurambopoios,a composer of dithyrambs,performedto the aulos.
Second, accordingto ps.-PlutarchDe musica 1136d (possibly based on
the fourth-centuryPeripatetic Aristoxenus), "the harmonikoi in their
historical works say that Pythoclides the aulete invented [the Mixoly-
dian harmonia] and also that Lamprocles the Athenian, realizing that
the disjunctionin this harmoniais not where almost everyone supposed
it to be, but at the top of its range, gave it the form of the series from
paramese to hypatehypaton."5Third,accordingto the scholiast to Plato
(?) Alcibiades I 118c 6, "Pythocleidestaught Agathocles who in turn
taught Lamprocles who in turn taught Damon." Pythocleides is else-
where said to have been one of Pericles' teachers, and Agathocles one
of Damon's and Pindar's.6
Else was right to call the reportby the scholiast to Alcibiades I an
"obviously apocryphaldiadoche."7We should keep in mind, however,
4 Dover, Clouds 215, also setting out the variants and different attributionsof this
verse. See also G. Arrighetti,"I1POx XIII 1611: alcuni problemi di erudizione antica,"
SCO 17 (1968) 85-89, and Page PMG p. 379. The discussion in POxy XIII 1611.
160-176 (= Chamaeleon fr. 29c Wehrli) refers (as does I E Ar. Nub. 967) to
Chamaeleon's uncertainty as to whether this text was composed by Lamprocles
(Chamaeleoncited Phrynichus'attribution)or else by Stesichorus(on whom Chamaeleon
wrote a book: Ath. 620c).
5 Trans. A. Barker,GreekMusical WritingsI, The Musician and his Art (Cambridge
1984) 221 (with n. 112 on the attributionto Aristoxenus).According to ps.-Plutarch(De
mus. 1136c-d), Aristoxenushimself claimed that the Mixolydian harmoniawas invented
by Sappho. Barker (ibid. n. 113) provides an explanation of the scalar modification
which ps.-Plutarchhere attributesto Lamprocles.
6 Pythocleides: Pl.(?) Alc. I 118c, Plut. Per 4, cf. also P1. Prt. 316e. Agathocles: P1.
Lch. 180c-d, Vit.Pind. Ambros.p. 1 line 12 Drachmann(see also Pind. vit. metr. line 11).
Despite Abert's suggestion (RE 12 [1924] 587; the possibility is countenanced,appar-
ently independently,by D. A. Campbell, Greek Lyric IV, Loeb Cl. Lib. 1992, p. 321),
there is no justificationfor identifying Lamprocleswith Lamprosho mousikos. Lampros
is said to have been the teacher of Sophocles (Ath. 20f) and was regardedas "highly rep-
utable"(eudokimos,along with Pindar,Pratinasand Dionysius of Thebes) by Aristoxenus
([Plut.] De mus. 1142b = fr. 76 Wehrli, see also Nep. 15.2). He is called "inferior"by
Plato's Socrates (Mnx. 236a) and attacked with great vituperationas a "water drinker"
and otherthings by the comic poet Phrynichus(fr. 78 K.-A. = Ath. 44d).
7 G. Else, "'Imitation'in the fifth century,"CP 53 (1958) 89 n. 55 (contrastJ. S. Mor-
rison, CQ 5 [1958] 205 ["all quite plausible"]). Lehnus, "Scopelino" 81, conjectures a
 An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music 75

that the scholiast's claim could have as its basis some similarity
between Pythocleides the aulete, Agathocles, and Lamprocles from
which student-teacherrelationships were later inferred.8Ps.-Plutarch
actually specifies that according to the harmonikoi,Lamproclesdevel-
oped a harmonia"invented"by the aulete Pythocleides.
In the light of these several associations of Lamprocles and the
aulos, the scholiasts' ActpnpoVoXo;grtoi &O Xrloi, "Lamproclesthe
athlete,"may be emended to read ro "Lam-
AcxugnpoKiXiot;g acuixbrlo1:
procles the aulete," as in Scopelinus 6 a Xrlri;g (Vit. Pind. Thom.: Pin-
dar's teacher) and Pythocleides 6a'Arlrig; (in ps.-Plutarch), whose
work Lamproclesis said to have revised. The paleographyis straight-
forward, a replacing 0 which is similar. We also have no reason to
associate Lamprocleswith athletics. Although Pindarmight sometimes
use athletic metaphors to describe his poetic endeavors,9so far as I
know the epithet "athlete"is never appliedto a musician.

(B) A REVOLUTIONIN AULOS MUSIC

The precedingemendation,if correct,adds to our meagreknowledge

of an importantfigurein the history of early fifth-centurymusic. It also

late fifth-century source, possibly Damon, for these and other musical relationships.
However, no written work by Damon (if he wrote anything)seems to have been accessi-
ble after his lifetime (see R. W. Wallace, "Damonedi Oa ed i suoi successori: un'analisi
delle fonti," in R. W. Wallace and B. MacLachlaned., HarmoniaMundi.Music and Phi-
losophy in the Ancient World,QUCC Suppl. 5 [1991] 32-45, esp. 42-45). For a different
suggestion concerningthe source of these statements,see next note.
8 On the doubtfulvalue of ancient claims of student-teacherrelationshipsand the pos-
sibility that such claims were narrativemetaphorsfor hypotheses of influence, see J. Fair-
weather,"Fictionin the biographiesof ancient writers,"AncSoc 5 (1974) 262-263; M. R.
Lefkowitz, The Lives of the Greek Poets (Baltimore 1981) 128-133; and below. The
views of the harmonikoi as recorded in PHibeh 13 (see Barker, Musical Writings I,
pp. 183-185) are close to those of Damon (see, e.g., W. Anderson,Ethos and Education
in GreekMusic [Cambridge,Mass., 1966] 149-150; Blass believed that Damon himself
was the subject of this text: see B. E Grenfell and A. S. Hunt ed., The Hibeh Papyri, Part
1 [Oxford 1906] 45-46). Therefore, since De mus. 1136d shows that the harmonikoi
wrote about Lamprocles,these harmonikoimay have been the source for the scholiast's
report of the relationship between Lamprocles and Damon. (Alternatives are
Chamaeleon,who certainlymentionedLamprocles [see n. 4 above], or Aristoxenushim-
self [with Lehnus, "Scopelino"78].)
9 See M. R. Lefkowitz, "ThePoet as Athlete,"SIFC 3.2 = 77 (1984) 5-12.
76 Robert W. Wallace

helps to place Lamproclesin the context of revolutionarydevelopments

in aulos music at Athens duringthis period. Aspects of this revolution
and the reactionagainstit have long been noted, beginningwith Aristo-
tle and Athenaeus as we shall see.10 Despite the shadowy nature of
these developmentsand the ambiguous,fragmentaryevidence that doc-
uments them, more can be said to identify the poet-musicianswho par-
ticipatedin this movement,and the specific issues they raised.
Traditionallylinked (in Greece) with Boeotia and the Peloponnese,11
at Athens the aulos was taken up both by citizen players and by serious
studentsof music in the early fifth century. Aristotlewrites (Pol. 1341a
26-35 [trans.Sinclairand Saunders]):

Our predecessors were right in prohibiting the use of the pipes

[auloi] by the young and by free men, though at an earlierperiod it
was permitted. This is what took place: as resources increased,
men had more leisure and acquireda loftier pride in standardsof
virtue; and both before and after the Persian Wars, in which their
success had increased their self-confidence, they fastened eagerly
upon learning of every kind, pursuing all without distinction; and
hence even playing on the pipes was introducedinto education ...
At Athens playing the pipes took such firmroot that many,perhaps
the majority,of the free men took partin it.

Athens' aulos revolution had two components, expanding that instru-

ment's role in social playing and in musical experimentation and
10 See
also A. Schneider,Zur Geschichteder Flote im Alterthum(Zurich 1890) 35-37
(excellent, though brief and now outdated); C. del Grande, Espressione Musicale dei
Poeti Greci (Naples 1932) 86-101; E. Roos, Die tragische Orchestikim Zerrbildder alt-
attischen Komodie (Lund 1951) 228-229; M. L. West, Ancient Greek Music (Oxford
1992) 34; W. Anderson,Music and Musicians in Ancient Greece (Ithaca 1994) 149.
" For the
Peloponnese, see esp. Clonas of Tegea ([Plut.] De mus. 1132c, 1133a,
1134b, Poll. 4.79), Echembrotusof Arcadia (Paus. 10.7.4) and Sacadas of Argos (Paus.
ibid. and 2.22.8-9, [Plut.] De mus. 1134a-c, Hesych. s.v. and Chamaeleonap.
laica•tov,
Ath. 184d); cf. also the local tradition that the aulos was invented by the Troezenian
Ardalos son of Hephaistos:Paus. 2.31.3, cf. Plut. Conv.sept. sap. 149f-150a, Steph. Byz.
s.v. 'ApiaXhi• ;. For the aulos's Spartanassociations, see Roos, Orchestik219 with reff.
For Boeotia, whose most famous aulete was perhapsthe late fifth-centuryPronomus,see,
e.g., Theophr.Hist. Pl. 4.11.4, Plut. Alc. 2, Ar. Ach. 860-866, Cratinusap. Poll. 7.88,
Chamaeleon (ibid.), and on Pronomus, Paus. 9.12.5-6, Ath. 184d and the text below.
H. Guhrauer,"ZurGeschichte der Aulodik bei den Griechen,"Progr.Waldenburg1879,
provides a brief survey of these early figures.
 An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music 77

research. Aulos experimentationand research are attributedfirst to

Lasos of Hermione, who worked in Athens under (Hdt. 7.6) and after
the Peisistratids,and who is said to have written the first book about
music.12Ps.-Plutarch(De mus. 1141c) reports,"Lasos of Hermione,by
altering the rhythms for the music of the dithyramb,and by pursuing
the example of the multiplicity of notes belonging to the aulos (and so
making use of more notes, widely scattered about), transformedthe
music that existed before him" (trans. Barker). According to the
Souda, Lasos introducedto Athens annual dithyrambiccontests, per-
formed to the aulos as we have noted.13
Lamprocles "the aulete" and dithurambopoiosmay be associated
with these developments. An Athenian,his cognomen and dithyrambs
link him with the aulos. Ps.-Plutarchreportshis research and experi-
mentation with harmoniai (De mus. 1136d, quoted above, in the third
paragraphof this essay). This passage furthersuggests an association
as a musical
with Lasos, who first (in extant texts) refers to hannrmoniai
form (fr. 702 Page), as againstthe older form of music called nomos.
Pythocleides and probably also Agathocles also had a role in this
movement. According to ps.-Plutarchas we have seen, Pythocleides
"the aulete" invented the Mixolydian harmonia, which Lamprocles
then revised. The Athenian Agathocles is mentioned together with
Pythocleides in P1.Prt. 316e. According to the scholiast to P1. (?) Alc.
I 118c, Agathocles was a student of Pythocleides. Finally, Agathocles
is variouslyattestedas the teacherof Pindarand Lamprocles(who then
taught Damon).14As we have noted, it is unlikely that the source of
this diadoche had any compelling documentation for it. However,
actual evidence for any student-teacherrelationshipswould carry less
significance-students sometimes repudiate their teachers-than the
presumptivebasis of the scholiast's claim, viz. some poetic or musico-
logical similarityor link between these persons.
Finally, Pindarmay also be considereda participantin Athens' aulos
12 Souda s.v., cf. Mart.
Cap. 9.936: musicamdivulgavitmortalibus.
13The MarmorParium(A 46) dates this introductionto 509 or 508: see A. W. Pickard-
Cambridge, Dithyramb, Tragedy and Comedy2, rev. T. B. L. Webster (Oxford 1962)
17-20. I hope to consider Lasos in detail in a subsequentpublication. For preliminary
remarkssee R. W. Wallace, "The sophists at Athens,"in D. Boedekerand K. A. Raaflaub
ed., Democracy,Empire,and the Arts in Fifth-CenturyAthens (Cambridge,Mass., 1998)
212-213.
14See schol. P1.(?) Alc. I 118c 6 and Vit.Pind. Ambros.,
quoted earlierin this essay.
78 RobertW Wallace

revolution.15Two Lives of Pindar variously identify his teachers as

Scopelinus "the aulete," Agathocles, and Lasos (in this case for the
lyre). Possibly reflecting later suspicion of the aulos as we shall see,
the Vita Thomana says that Scopelinus "taughtPindar the aulos, and
when he saw that he had unusual skill, handed him over to the lyric
poet Lasos of Hermione, who taught him the lyre." After mentioning
Scopelinus, the Vita Ambrosiana states that "some say that Pindar's
teacher at Athens was Agathocles, others Apollodorus."16As we have
seen, Agathocles was probably part of the new aulos movement.
Lefkowitz has suggested that these traditionsmay reflect the Athenians'
attemptto claim Pindar,as they also claimed Tyrtaeus.17She compares
the tradition that the Thebans fined young Pindar for writing a
dithyrambin praise of Athens (= fr. 76 S.-M.), and the Athenianspaid
the fine (Vit.Ambros.I p. 1. 16). On the other hand, Pindarhad various
associations with Athens (01. 8.54-66, Nem. 4.93, 5.49, 6.67, Pyth. 7),
and in 497/6 is reportedto have won a victory in Athens' dithyrambic
contests (POxy 2438). He also wrote dithyrambsin praise of Athens,
and to the Thebans:"Oh! the gleaming and the violet-crowned,and the
sung in story, the bulwark of Hellas, famous Athens, city divine" (fr.
76, trans. Sandys, see also 75, 77, 78, writtenfor Athenianoccasions).
Even if based on inadequateevidence, biographicaltraditionsmay indi-
cate what were laterjudged to be Pindar'smusical affiliations. Pindar
is not said to have been the studentof Simonides, who also worked in
Athens but was not sympathetic to the aulos revolution (as we shall
see).
Furthermore,in fr. 70b S.-M., Pindarpraises new dithyrambicstyles
(something associated with Lasos), seeming to allude favorablyto new
dithyrambicasigmatism: "In earlier times the song of the dithyrambs
crept along, stretchedout like a rope, and the 's' came out base-born
from men's mouth" (trans. Barker). According to Athenaeus (455c,
and see 624e-f; also Strabo 10.3.13), asigmatismwas an experimentof
Lasos. Barker suggests that Pindar rejected Lasos's condemnationof

15See very briefly Pickard-Cambridge,Dithyramb23, and G. Comotti,Music in Greek

and Roman Culture(Baltimore 1989) 29-30; see also D. A. Campbell, The Golden Lyre
(London 1983) 183-184.
16Pind. Vit.Ambr I p. 1.2-5, 11-15 and Pind. Vit. Thornm.
= Scholia vetera in Pindari
carmina I, ed. Drachmann(Leipzig 1903) 4.10-15. For Agathocles, see n. 6 above and
Lehnus, "Scopelino." Apollodorusis otherwiseunknown.
17Lefkowitz, Lives 59-60.
 An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music 79

sigma, because his poem does not avoid them.18However, we cannot

suppose that even Lasos regularly avoided sigmas in his poetry.
According to Cleonides as Athenaeusquotes him (455c), "Pindarcom-
posed these lines almost as a riddle, because he was unable to abstain
from the letter 's', and they did not approveof it." Pindar'sdithyrambic
style was certainly regardedas bold and innovative in later antiquity:
per audaces nova dithyrambos/ verba devolvit numerisquefertur / lege
solutis (Hor. Carm. 4.2.10-12). One can only imagine the music that
accompaniedPindar'sdithyrambic"krotalaclatter ... the loud-sound-
ing wails and frenzies and shouts of the river nymphs" (fr. 70b9-14
S.-M., trans.Barker).
Finally, althoughthe aulos had Boeotian associations and a common
Greek traditionattributedits invention to the PhrygianHyagnis, father
of Marsyas,19in 490 Pindar, a Theban, attributedits invention to
Athena (Pyth. 12).20 Although we cannot prove that Pindar himself
invented this tale, it is nonetheless a rarity in the ancient sources.21
Pindar's story hellenizes, and possibly associates with Athens, an
instrument which the Greeks typically regarded as foreign.22Pindar
18 Barker,Musical
WritingsI, p. 59 n. 20, and see del Grande,Espressione87.
19See Ath. 624b citing Aristoxenus,[Plut.]De mus. 1132f, 1133d-f, Marm. Par. A 10,
Anonym. Bellerm. 28, Apul. Florid. 1.3, and other sources listed in H. Huchzermeyer,
Aulos und Kitharain der griechischenMusik bis zumAusgang der klassischenZeit (diss.
Emsdetten 1931) 14 n. 57. For the myths about Marsyas, see B. Leclercq-Neveu,
"Marsyas,le martyrde l'aulos," Metis 4 (1989) 251-268.
20See A. Kohnken, "Perseus' Kampf und Athenes Erfindung,"Hermes 104 (1976)
263-265. For other reportsof Athena and the aulos, see Diod. Sic. 5.49.1, Hygin. Fab.
165, and Plut. De cohib. ir. 456b, quoting lines from a satyrplay possibly by Euripides(=
TrGF2 Adesp. 381). On Pindar'suse of the myth in Pyth. 12, see C. Segal, "The Gorgon
and the Nightingale:The Voice of Female Lamentand Pindar'sTwelfthPythian Ode,"in
Aglaia. The Poetry of Alcman, Sappho, Pindar, Bacchylides, and Corinna (New York
1994) 85-104. On the aulos in this text, see B. Gentili and F. Luisi, "LaPitica 12 di Pin-
daro e l'aulo di Mida,"QUCC49 (1995) 7-31.
In addition Corinna, also Boeotian, is said to have claimed that Athena taught the
Delphian Apollo how to play the aulos ([Plut.] De mus. 1136b). This may be significant
in the present context even if Corinnawas not an early fifth-centurypoet but Hellenistic
and archaizing. See M. L. West, "Corinna,"CQ 20 (1970) 277-287 (3rd century B.c.),
and C. H. Segal, "Pebbles in Golden Urns: The Date and Style of Corinna,"Eranos 73
(1975) 1-8, Aglaia 315-326 (perhapsinclining toward the late 3rd century). (In Camb.
Hist. Class. Lit. I Gk. Lit. [1982] 240, Segal remarksthat the question "remainsopen.")
21 See otherwiseNonnus, Dionys. 40.228-233 and the schol. to Ov. Met. 4.618 ff.
22See F. Frontisi-Ducroux,"Ath6naet l'inventionde la flfite,"Musica e Storia 2 (1994)
242.
80 RobertW.Wallace

wrote a prooimion in honor of the ancient aulete Sacadas of Argos

(Paus. 10.30.2). He praises the power of "the lovely song of the auloi
to stir the dolphins in the waveless deep" (fr. 140b S.-M.).23
Although personal details about the early poets must always be
approachedwith caution, the evidence here seems reasonably consis-
tent. At Athens Pindarstudiedboth stringedinstrumentsand the aulos,
probably with Lasos, and he was influenced by the new dithyrambic
styles.
By contrast, both Simonides and Anacreon apparently distanced
themselves from the aulos revolution. Simonides "the lyric poet" (ho
lurikos, ho melopoidn)recountedthe story of Marsyas and the aulos in
a way unflatteringto Marsyas,with his "greedymouth."24According to
Pliny NH 7.204, Simonides added an eighth stringto the lyre. The tra-
dition is doubtful, but suggests that Simonides was at least later linked
to experimentationwith stringed instruments. In Aristophanes' Wasps
(1410-1411), Lasos is said to have competed against Simonides and
remarked,"I don't care." In Clouds 1352-1354, Simonides is a symbol
of old-fashionedpoetry,someone Strepsiadeswould enjoy.
As for Anacreon who like Lasos worked at the court of Hipparchos
([P1.] Hipparch. 228c), Critias (DK 88 B 1.4) is said to have reported
that he was aM~ov 6&vrintaXog, cptko6pdatto; (= fr. 181 Gentili).
Critias may have known something about these issues, as accordingto
Chamaeleon(Ath. 184d = fr. 3 Wehrli)he himself was famous for play-
ing the aulos. Simonides' epitaphfor Anacreonpraises his barbiton(fr.
126 D.). The Hellenistic historianand biographerNeanthes of Cyzicus
(ap. Ath. 175e) stated that Anacreon actually inventedthe barbiton. It
is easy to imagine a situation of court rivalry between Lasos and
Anacreon,as Lasos was Simonides' rival later. We must note, however,
that along with the many-stringedpektis (fr. 69, 72 D.) and "twenty-
stringed magadis" (fr. 70 D.), Anacreon also mentions aulos music
without comment (fr. 18 D.). As with Lasos and Pindar, all of these
poet-musiciansmust have workedwith a varietyof instruments.
An importantperiod of musical development can thus be recon-
structed during the shadowy decades of early fifth-century Athens.
During these years, innovationsin instrumentationand musical experi-
mentation first attested for Lasos were developed by Pindar, Lam-
23The
dolphins' fondness for aulos music was or became a standardconceit: see Eur.
Elec. 435-436, Ar. Frogs 1317-1318.
24Plut. De cohib. ir. 456c = Simonides fr. 160 D.
 An Early Fifth-CenturyAthenianRevolutionin Aulos Music 81

procles, Pythocleides and probably also Agathocles. Details of the

relationships between these poet-musicians cannot be reconstructed.
They may have been friends, teachersand students,or rivals. However,
their participationin a nexus of musical innovationsis apparent. There-
fore, an era of great poetic and (in particular)dramaticevolution at
Athens was also markedby revolutionarychanges in music.
In a broader social context, Aristotle's Politics indicates that the
aulos became more widely practiced and respected in Athens both
before and after the PersianWars. In the light of Aristotle's own con-
demnation of the aulos (as we shall see), his testimony is especially
striking in that he and other conservativesbelieved that at the time of
the PersianWarsAthens was ably managedand the Atheniansbehaved
themselves well.25 His report about the aulos finds some confirmation
in the admittedly exiguous sources for musical practice during this
period. As we have seen, according to (ps.-?)Plato (Alcib. I 118c) and
Plutarch (Per. 4), Pericles (b. ca. 495) studied with Pythocleides and
Damon. Pythocleides was known as an aulete, and Damon is said to
have been his pupil. According to Aulus Gellius 15.17 citing Pamphila
(a woman writer of Miscellanies at the time of Nero), Pericles
summoned the Theban Antigenidas to teach the aulos to his ward
Alcibiades (b. ca. 450), "something then considered honestissimum."
The evidence of vase paintingis also suggestive. An unsystematiccan-
vass of the photographsof Attic vases in my university'slibraryyielded
124 scenes of aulos players between ca. 560 and ca. 400 B.C. As might
be expected from representationson drinking cups and kraters,in all
periods the great majorityof auloi are depicted in Dionysiac symposion
or komos scenes. Of sixth-centuryvases, 23 of 29 illustrationsare of
this type; the other six show processions, musical performances,and
war dances. This percentage of drinking scenes is roughly typical of
my samples from 500-450 and 450-400. However, uniquely in the
period 500-450, five scenes (out of some 56 vases) depict young men
being taughtto play the aulos. Vase paintings,of course, are not snap-
shots of Atheniandaily life. They need only show that aulos education
became a subjectof interestto vase painters,and also cannot prove that
upper-class aulos education was new. At a minimum, however, the
painters' new awareness of aulos education does imply a more con-
scious conceptualizationof such education,and quite possibly therefore
25 See Arist. Pol. 1273b35-1274a21,
1304a17-24 and, e.g., Isoc. 7.36-55.
82 Robert W Wallace

its greaterprominencein Athens. This prominenceis directly attested

by Aristotle'sPolitics.

(C) A REACTION

By mid-century, however, the aulos had become controversial.

Henceforthit ceased to be the principalinstrumentof Athens' musical
researchers,and in some upper-classcircles it fell sharplyout of fash-
ion for both education and citizen playing.26In Pol. 1341a26-35, after
commenting on the popularityof the aulos at the time of the Persian
Wars,Aristotle states: "But at a later date, as a result of actual experi-
ence, the playing of auloi went out of favor, as men became better able
to discern what tends to promote virtue and what does not." The
reduced role of the aulos in favor of stringedinstrumentsis first docu-
mented in the plastic arts. From mid-centurythe satyr Marsyas was
frequently represented, beginning with Myron's famous sculpture
group probably of the 450s (Athena throws the aulos away in disgust,
and Marsyas picks it up), and including vase scenes where Marsyas is
shown not flayed but learning or even playing the lyre (ratherthan the
aulos).27In ARV2, 19 vases after 450 B.C.show Apollo competing with
his lyre againstMarsyas and his aulos. No such scenes are recordedon
red or black figure vases before 450. The different Marsyas myths
mark off the aulos as an anti-lyre.28Wilson observes ("Aulos"61) that
after Myron's sculpture group on the Akropolis, anyone who took up
the aulos implicitly aligned himself with Phrygian satyrs, even as
Myron's work simultaneouslyincorporatedthe aulos "into the heart of
civic life." In my unsystematicsurvey of 124 photographsof auloi on
vases, after450 no young men are shown being taughtthe aulos, and no
26 Some of these developmentsare briefly discussed by Schneider,Flote 37, Huchzer-
meyer, Aulos 57-63, and B. Zimmermann,"Oberlegungenzum sogenannten Pratinas-
fragment,"MH 43 (1986) 152-153. Cf. Barker, Musical Writings I, pp. 93-98 ("The
musical revolutionof the later fifth century"),not howeverfocused on the aulos.
27See T. B. L. Webster, The Greek Chorus (London 1970) 132-133, J. Boardman,
"Some Attic Fragments:Pot, Plaque, and Dithyramb,"JHS 76 (1956) 18-20 (with further
references), H. Metzger, Les Reprdsentationsdans la ceramique attique du Ve sihcle
(Paris 1951) 58-68, A. Stewart,GreekSculpture:An Exploration(New Haven 1990) 147.
See also Roscher, Myth. Lex. s.v. "Marsyas."Metzger notes that these Marsyas scenes
were especially popularin the last quarterof the fifth century.
28See also LIMC6
(1992) 366-378.
 inAulosMusic
AthenianRevolution
AnEarlyFifth-Century 83

beardedmen are shown playing it, even at symposia (a not uncommon

type of scene earlier).
As for literaryevidence, Athenaeus (616e-617b) writes of Melanip-
pides, a prominent dithyrambic poet (Xen. Mem. 1.4.3), music
researcher,and member of the avant-gardesometime around or after
mid-century:29"Onthe subjectof auloi someone said thatMelanippides
had ridiculed aulos-playingsplendidly in his Marsyas, when he said of
Athena: 'Athena threw the instrumentsfrom her holy hand and said
"Away,shameful things, defilers of my body! I do not give myself to
ugliness""' (trans.Barker,Musical WritingsI, p. 273). Barkersuggests
that despite Athenaeus's comment, this passage "need not be taken to
represent Melanippides' own attitude to the aulos: he was, after all,
composing for it, and the story of Athena and the auloi was a tradi-
tional subjectpositively begging to be set by a composer with a special-
ist knowledge of auletic techniques." Wilson points out the sense of
paradox implicit in Athena's condemnationof the aulos which Mela-
nippides set to the music of that instrument("Aulos" 62-63). Such
speculations are surely provocative. On the other hand, as we have
seen, the rareAthena myth is attestedfirst in 490 (Pyth. 12), and rather
than a "traditionalsubject,"may have been fairly novel when Melanip-
pides wrote. Not only Athenaeus's source, with access to Melanippi-
des' entire poem ("Melanippideshad ridiculed .. .") but also Telestes,
who was thoughtto have respondedin defense of the aulos (see below),
and the famous anecdote about Alcibiades which echoes this story
(again below), imply hostility to the aulos.30Even though Melanippides
was in parta dithyrambicpoet, the fifth-centurycomic poet Pherecrates
(ap. [Plut.] De mus. 1141d-1142a) associates him ratherwith research
on stringed instruments,as the first to innovate with a twelve-stringed
kithara. In Pherecrates'comedy, Music protests:"Melanippidesstarted
my troubles. He was the first of them: he grabbedme and pulled me
down, and loosened me up with his twelve strings"(trans.Barker,ibid.
236). As Wilson himself notes ("Aulos"65 n. 32), we do not know that
Melanippides'Marsyas was a dithyramb.

29 Barker,Musical WritingsI, p. 93, dates his activity ca. 480-430; West, GreekMusic
357, ca. 440-415 (West's terminal date is presumably supplied by the destruction of
Melos, Melanippides'native island).
30For anotherrebuketo Athena for playing the auloi, see Plut. De cohib. ir. 456b, pos-
sibly from a satyrplay by Euripides(and n. 20 above).
84 Robert W Wallace

Furthermore,in his famous "hyporcheme"the poet "Pratinas"31

complains aboutaulos music:32

&v'6pea o•ievov e.te&Nai'diov

tE IlXo;.
olda K•JCvovayova ntotrKL6xtrpov
. yd' 8o6
ioatepovXopelEo Ktoa p ' jrrlpXac8.
ECdgo
;tEvov
O;pa0 tot lE
Etr taiaOtVEgonv Oot rtapoiwov

cgitrEvataTpatcrl
da~,...
Whatis this noise? What are these dances?
What is this madness at the resoundingaltarof Dionysos?
Mine, mine is Bromios, it is for me to cry, for me to make the
noise,
rangingthe mountainswith Naiads,
like a swan leading the many-feathered[winged?]tune.
The song the muse has made queen, let the pipe
dance afterwards.For it is the servant.
It can only lead the revel and the streetfights
of young drunkards...

Roos (Orchestik218-219) arguedthat "Pratinas"'spoem is not directed

against the aulos but merely excessive aulos music in the worship of
Dionysos. Yet the final lines of this passage are negative enough.
Aulos music "can only lead the revel and the street fights of young
drunkards."Although the date of this text has long been controversial,
for metrical and other reasons Zimmermannhas now convincingly
31The quotationmarks are to distinguishthis poet from the earlier fifth-centuryPrati-
nas. See below.
32Ath. 617b-f = Page PMG no. 708; trans.Picard-Cambridge,Dithyramb17-18 (with
minor changes). On the controversyover the genre of this poem, see Picard-Cambridge,
ibid. 20; R. Seaford, "The 'Hyporchema'of Pratinas,"Maia 29-30 (1977-1978) 84-94;
and Zimmermann,"Pratinasfragment" 145-146. A. Barker,"Heterophoniaand Poikilia:
Accompaniments to Greek Melody," in Mousike. Metrica ritmica e musica greca in
memoria di Giovanni Comotti, ed. B. Gentili and F Perusino (Pisa and Rome 1995)
46-47, shows that in part "Pratinas"objects to the aulos playing heterophonic notes
which are "obtrusivelydifferentfrom those properto the melody."
 An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music 85

defended the "low" dating (ca. 450-400) earlier proposed by Lloyd-

Jones and accepted by Webster.33Before the revised chronology, most
scholars thought that "Pratinas"'spoem was directed against the musi-
cal innovationsespecially of Lasos.34If this poem is rightly redatedto
the end of the period of the aulos revolution,however, "Pratinas"'saim
was probably directed more generally against those broader musical
trends, and not primarily against Lasos who had helped to originate
them severalgenerationsearlier.
From mid-century, music researchers at Athens turned from the
aulos to stringed instruments. I have noted Pherecrates'joke about
Melanippides' twelve strings. According to the scholiast to Aristo-
phanes Clouds 970, Phrynisof Mytilene, who was awardedfirstprize at
the first musical contest held in Pericles' Odeion (446?), was trainedin
aulodia but changed to the cithara. He is also said to have added extra
strings to the cithara, and introduced "bendings,"perhaps from one
harmonia to another, in the scalar system.35Ps.-Plutarchwrites (De
mus. 1133b), "In general, the style of singing to the kithara employed
by Terpandercontinued in a quite simple form down to the time of
Phrynis." Towardthe end of the century, both Timotheus of Miletus
(who accordingto Arist. Met. 993c was Phrynis's student) and Philox-
enus are also associated with stringedinstrumentshaving an unconven-
tionally large number of strings.36Although Timotheus also wrote
dithyrambs,he was associated especially with the kithara,as various
texts (e.g., Macr. Sat. 5.22.4s = Loeb fr. 778) and his epitaph indicate.
"Miletus was the fatherlandthat bore the delight of the Muses, Timo-
theus, the skillful driver of the kithara"(Steph. Byz. s.v. "Miletos" =

33Zimmermann,"Pratinasfragment" 145-154, see also H. Lloyd-Jones, "Problemsof

Early Greek Tragedy:Pratinasand Phrynichus,"Cuadernos de la Fundacidn Pastor 13
(1966) 16-18 (repr.with minor updates and changes in Greek Epic, Lyric, and Tragedy.
The Academic Papers of Sir Hugh Lloyd-Jones [Oxford 1990] 227-230), Webster,Cho-
rus 132-133. For the earlierdating see, e.g., Picard-Cambridge,Dithyramb65-66.
34See T. Bergk, Griech. Literaturgesch.3 (Berlin 1884) 263, Schneider, Flote 36,
Picard-Cambridge,Dithyramb17-20, Seaford, "Hyporchema"81-84.
35For his change from aulodia, see Souda s.v. (Dpivt. Victory in Panathenaia:schol.
Ar. Clouds 971. Bendings: Ar. Clouds 971. Extra strings:Poll. 4.66, Plut. Agis. 10, Plut.
Inst. Lac. 17, Ion fr. 3 B, Proclus Chrest. 320a. See also Barker,Musical WritingsI,
p. 94.
36For Phrynis,see also Souda s.v.; for Timotheus,see Ion fr. 6 = I 70 D. ("TheEleven-
String Lyre"), Pherecrates' Chiron (quoted below), Ath. 636e, Plut. Inst. Lac. 238c-d,
Paus. 3.12.10. For Philoxenus, see Barker,Musical WritingsI, pp. 94-95.
86 RobertW.Wallace

Loeb fr. 5). A speciality of this laterperiod was imitatingthe sounds of

the aulos on stringedinstruments(P1.Laws 700).
As a furtheraspect of these developments,in Athens duringthe sec-
ond half of the fifth century the role of the aulos in upper-classeduca-
tion notably weakened. In our sources this developmentis associated
especially with Alcibiades (b. ca. 450), who like Athena is said to have
rejected the instrumentbecause it made him look ugly. In (ps.-?)Plato
Alcibiades I 106e, Sokrates says that Alcibiades had learned writing,
kithara playing, and wrestling, "but didn't want to learn aulos
playing."37According to Plutarch(Alc. 2), afterAlcibiades made fun of
the aulos and anyone who learnedit, "he emancipatedhimself from this
discipline, along with the rest of the boys ... In consequence the aulos
disappearedfrom the pastimes of free men, and came to be utterly
despised." Pamphila'sreport(in Gell. 15.17) is similar.
Finally, despite the extraordinaryprominence of the dithyrambin
Athenian public life, especially during the GreatDionysia when 1,000
Athenianmen and boys performedtribal dithyrambsin groups of fifty,
very few of the composers of these dithyrambswere Athenian natives
(Wilson, "Aulos,"63 and n. 20).
On the other hand, aversion to the aulos was not uniform, either
among the poetic elite or among Athens' upper classes. Telestes of
Selinus, who at least competed at Athens (winning the dithyrambic
prize in 402/1: Marm.Par. 79), was thoughtto have counteredMelanip-
pides in defense of the aulos.38Following his discussion of Melanippi-
des' poem, Athenaeuscontinues (616e-617b, trans.Barker):

Someone else responded by saying "But Telestes of Selinus hit

back at Melanippides in his Argo: speaking of Athena he said:
'When the clever goddess had picked up the clever instrumentin
the mountainthickets, I cannot believe in my mind that she, divine
Athena, frightenedby the ugliness unpleasantto the eye, threw it
away again from her hands to be a glory to Marsyas,thathandclap-
ping creatureborn of a nymph. Why would sharppassion for love-
inducing beauty have worried her, to whom Clotho had allotted
37 By contrast,accordingto Athenaeus 184d citing Duris, the ThebanPronomustaught
Alcibiades the aulos. Wilson ("Aulos"89) notes that Alcibiades' rejectionof the aulos is
assigned to his youth.
38Wilson ("Aulos" 65) defends the chronological possibility that Telestes directly
respondedto Melanippidesin a text performedbefore the Atheniandemos.
 An Early Fifth-Century Athenian Revolution in Aulos Music 87

virginity, marriagelessand childless?' (He means that she would

not have sought to avoid ugliness in her appearancebecause of her
virginity.) ... Afterwards he extols the art of the aulos, saying:
'Which the uplifted breath39of the noble goddess, with the swift-
ness of her quivering-wingedhands, passed on to Dionysos to be
his best helper.' In the Asclepius, too, Telestes ornately expressed
the use of the auloi.

Telestes himself was a musical radical (Barker, Musical Writings I,

p. 97). In Aristophanes'Daitales (fr. 221 K. = 232 K.-A.), learningto
play both aulos and lyre is a symbol of a clever new education.
According to Chamaeleon (ap. Ath. 184d = fr. 3 Wehrli),both Callias
the son of Hipponicus (b. ca. 450) and Critias the son of Callaeschrus
(b. ca. 460) played the aulos. Xenophon (Mem. 1.2.27) implies that in
some form at least, the aulos continued to be taught. According to
Strabo (1.2.3), Aristoxenus and others commended instructionin both
the aulos and the lyre for their ability to shape character. Although my
informal survey of vase paintings after 450 showed no young men
learning the aulos or beardedmen playing it, several vases now depict
respectablewomen playing that instrument,in domestic settings.
In contexts other than research,poetic exposition, and musical edu-
cation among certainelite citizens, the aulos continuedto occupy a cen-
tral position in Attic society, especially as an accompaniment for
dithyrambicand dramaticperformancesand at sacrifices. Oliver Taplin
has called attentionto the ever more splendid,full-length robes of aule-
tai on vase paintings, especially for Athens' great public competi-
tions.40As we have seen, from the time of "Pratinas'shyporcheme"the
music of the aulos could take precedence over poetic texts.41Prizes in
aulos competitionswere fewer in numberand lower in value than those
for the kithara,42and the players themselves were almost invariablyfor-
39 On the text, see G. Comotti, "Atenae gli auloi in un ditirambodi Teleste,"QUCC 5
(1980) 47-54.
40 0. Taplin, Comic Angels and Other Approaches to Greek Drama through Vase-
Paintings (Oxford 1993) 70-71.
41 See [Plut.] De mus. 1141d (the mention of Melanippidesis judged to be an interpo-
lation: Pickard-Cambridge,Dithyramb 18-19 followed by Seaford, "Hyporchema,"see
also Weil and Reinach's edition of De musica), Ath. 617b-f, and Pickard-Cambridgeibid.
55. For the aulos in sacrifice, see J. Haldane, "MusicalInstrumentsin Greek Worship,"
G&R 13 (1966) 98-107.
42 See IG 1122311.20-22.
88 RobertW Wallace

eigners or slaves-"Athenians are virtuallyinvisible" (Wilson, "Aulos"

70). Yet many sources attest the aulos's enduringpopularity,especially
in popularcontexts.
The Greeks themselves offered a variety of explanations for the
diminished appeal of the aulos after 450, at least in certain elite con-
texts. As the final lines of "Pratinas'shyporcheme" indicate, elite
controversy over this instrumentmay in part have resulted from its
powerful emotional effects, especially apparentat funerals and wed-
dings, in symposia where auletrides were a regular feature, and in
tragedies and dithyrambicperformances(see Wilson, "Aulos"74-76).
In a Bacchic context Sophocles' chorus proclaims a&Eipopato86'
xaX6v, J tipavvE c&gt -&g;ppev6; (Trach.216-217).
A6buropoatr6v
In the aulos is the instrumentof madness (871,
Euripides' Herakles
879, 897).43 According to the comic poet Phrynichus (fr. 67 K.-A.),
auletes were associated with great sybariasmos.44In the next century
Plato banned the aulos from both of his ideal states (Resp. 399d, Leg.
669, 700). For Plato, the lyre was a steady and traditionalinstrument
suitable for preserving the traditional harmoniai, but the aulos was
capable of musical revolution, mixing harmoniai, producing strange
noises, and destroying the balance of voice and instrument. In Symp.
215b-c, Socrates observes that "Marsyashad only to put his aulos to
his lips to bewitch mankind-which still can be done by anyone who
can play the tunes he used to play ... Whoever plays them, from an
absolute virtuoso to a twopenny-halfpennyauletris, the tunes will still
have a magic power" (trans. M. Joyce). Aristotle concludes his brief
history of the aulos with the myth of Athena throwing away the aulos.
"It may well be ... that the goddess did this because she disliked the
facial distortion... But a far more likely reason is that an educationin
playing upon the pipes contributesnothing to the intellect." Intellectual
or philosophical objections to the aulos continueddown throughantiq-
uity. Athenaeusquotes an epigram,"in an aulete the gods implantedno
sense [noos], / for together with his blowing, his sense [noos] also flies
away" (337e-f). In his Life of Pythagoras (111) lamblichus states that
the Pythagoreansused the lyre "because Pythagorasthought the aulos
had an assertive tone, suited to large gatherings but not to cultivated
people." Aristides Quintilianus quotes lamblichus as counselling his

43 For the aulos in tragedy,see above all part3 of Wilson's "Aulos."

44For the sounds and emotional effects of the aulos, see West, GreekMusic 105-106.
 An Early Fifth-CenturyAthenianRevolutionin Aulos Music 89

students to avoid hearing the sound of the aulos, as something "stain-

ing" the spirit. The lyre chases away the irrationaldesires of the soul.45
Several other factors will also have worked against the aulos. First
as we have seen, the aulos was typically associatedwith Boeotia, which
had especially complicated political relations with Athens at mid-
century. In 457 the Boeotians and Spartans defeated the Athenians
at Tanagra. Two months later the Athenians returned to defeat the
Boeotians at Oenophyta. Athens henceforthdominatedits hated neigh-
bor (dramatistsrepresentedThebes as an "anti-Athens"46) until a major
military defeat at Coronea in 446. Thebes was always famous for its
auletes.47Although extant sources do not mention this explanation,
mid-century would be a good time to reject the "Boeotian"
instrument.48
Second, the growing complexities of music will have limited the
aulos's role in citizens' social playing, especially because it is much
more difficult to play notes precisely on the aulos than on stringed
instruments.49The difficulty and complexity of aulos playing are
specifically noted by Theophrastus(Hist. P1. 4.11.4-5) and later by
Lucian (Harmonid.1). Equally important,masteringthe requisiteskills
to producegood music on the aulos put one at risk of becoming banau-
sic, a "mechanic." Isocrates is said to have been ridiculed by Aristo-
phanes and Strattisas an "aulos-borer"(Strattisfr. 3 K.-A., cf. K.-A.'s
numerous testimonia), supposedly because his father owned an aulos
factory (Plut. Mor. 836e). Philostratos (Vit. Soph. 1.17.4) defended
Isocrates as knowing nothing of auloi or anything else en banausiois.
Aristotle questions at length how far it is properfor eleutheroito learn

45 See Aristid. Quint. 91.27-92.3 W.-I., Iambl. De myst. 3.9, and contrastAth. 184e.
Plutarchtells of a party he attended that got seriously out of control because of aulos
music (Quaest. Conv.704c-706e).
46 See E Zeitlin, "Thebes:Theaterof Self and Society in Athenian Drama,"in Nothing
to Do with Dionysos? AthenianDrama in its Social Context,ed. J. Winklerand F Zeitlin
(Princeton 1990) esp. 144-150.
47 See Chameleonand Aristoxenusap. Ath. 184d-e (and also Nepos Epam. 2.1), Max-
imus of Tyre, Philos. 17.2 (Orlp•xiotat)Xyrztcilvintiorl
ovytF cXairtiv 1~8t' a Xlv
entXc(ipto;g oig Bottoiro); Dio Chrys. Or. 7.121; Anth. Pal. 3.8; Huchzermeyer,
tgokca47-48. The schools of
Aulos Pronomus, Antigenidas, and Dorion, all Thebans, were
famous (see Barker,Musical WritingsI, p. 97).
48 See I. Kasper-Butz,Die GottinAthena im klassischenAthen: Athena als Reprdisen-
tantin des demokratischenStaates (Frankfurta. M. 1990) 184.
49 See West, GreekMusic 94-96.
90 RobertW Wallace

to play any kind of music (Pol. 1340b20-1341b18). He argues that

music must not be studied to a high level of competence, for this would
make the performer a banausos and thus interfere with his citizen's
arete. "Infact,"he says, "we call music performersbanausoi, and think
that a man should not performexcept for his own amusementor when
he has had a good deal to drink"(Pol. 1339b9-10, trans. Sinclair and
Saunders). According to Plutarch (Per. 1), when Antisthenes the
Socratic heard that the Theban Ismenias was an excellent aulos player,
he remarked,"yes, but he's a base man; for otherwise he wouldn't be a
serious aulos-player."50Plutarch also reports that when Philip II of
Macedon was asked which of two aulos players was the better, he
replied, "Polyperchonis the better general"(Pyrrh 8.7). Plutarchhas a
favorite anecdote about an argumentbetween Philip and a lyre-player,
who remarked,"I hope you won't be in such a bad way, king, that you
would know more about this than I do."'5From the later fifth century
on, music performancewas increasinglyin the hands of professionals.52
The vagaries involved in playing the aulos (in comparison with
stringed instruments)also limited its appeal for music researchers. In
Philebus 56a, Socrates condemns the aulos because it is impossible to
hit notes precisely, ratherthan by "the luck of a practicedfinger."The
fourth-century music theoretician Aristoxenus (Elem. Harm. 43.14
Meib.) condemnedthe aulos for the imprecisionof its notes, as provid-
ing no basis for formulating the laws of harmonics. According to
Athenaeus 174e, he also claimed that it was too easy for the untaughtto
play the aulos or syrinx, like shepherds.
Finally, as other periods illustrate, shifts in musical fashion may be
influenced by comparativelytrivial or serendipitousevents, the evolu-
tion of taste, or simply the search for fresh or innovative means of
expression. In other matterstoo, constant innovationwas an Athenian
characteristic.

50oCompare Plut. De Alex. fort. 334b: Ismenias played before the Scythian king who
rudely and ignorantlyswore that his own horses sounded better-presumably when fart-
ing.
51De adul. et amic. 67f, Reg. et imp. apophtheg. 179b, De Alex. fort. 334c-d, Symp.
634c-d.
52See R. W. Wallace, "Speech, song and text, public and private. Evolutions in com-
municationsmedia and fora in fourth-centuryAthens,"in Die athenische Demokratie im
4. Jahrhundertv. Chr Vollendung oder Verfall einer Verfassungsform?,ed. W. Eder
(Stuttgart1995) 210-212.
 AnEarlyFifth-Century
AthenianRevolutioninAulosMusic 91

With the notable exceptions of Thebes,53Alexandria(Ath. 176e-f),

and Sparta,the unfashionabilityof the aulos at least in some elite cir-
cles spreadthroughoutthe Greek and Roman worlds. Cicero remarks,
"as they say of Greek musicians, those who cannot become citharodes
are aulodes" (Mur. 13.29). Athenaeus observes that "to all Greeks in
the old days" music was of such concern that they even showed enthu-
siasm for the aulos (184d). Pamphilanotes (we have seen) that aulos
playing in fifth-centuryAthens was then considered honestissimum.
Ptolemy XII's cognomen "auletes"(Strab.795, Plut. De adul. 56f) was
not meant as a compliment.
Outside elite circles, however, in the traditionalcontexts of theater,
dithyramb,and cult, and especially in the post-Classical periods, the
aulos continued to be much enjoyed. According to [Aristotle] Prob-
lemata 19.43, musical solos were more pleasant if sung to the aulos
than to the lyre. According to Theopompus (ap. Ath. 435b, see also
338b), Philip of Macedon kept the aulete Dorion constantlyby him. At
Quaes. Conv. 712f-713b, Plutarchpays glowing tributeto aulos music
at the symposion - despite its dangerouspotential (see n. 45). Reinach
documents the fame of traveling auletes during the Hellenistic and
Roman periods, and the ongoing importanceof the aulos in cult.54In
non-Atheniancontexts, musical research and experimentationwith the
aulos also continued. The Theban Pronomus(ca. 400) is credited with
devising auloi on which several different harmoniai could be played,
presumablyby means of rotatingcollars to block or open holes.55
If Phrynichuswas right to assign a line in Clouds to the aulete Lam-
procles, the phenomenon is not unparalleledthat within two genera-
tions a musical innovator should come to be regarded (by Dikaios
Logos) as a pillar of the old order.56In Aristophanes' time the great
musical villain was Timotheus of Miletus, who openly boasted of his
new music (fr. 796 Page).57When Pherecrates"putMusic on the stage
in the guise of a woman, her whole body displaying signs of ill-treat-
53 See, e.g., G. F. Brussich, "Un auleta del IV sec. a C.: Timoteo di Tebe" in Mousike,
ed. Gentili and Perusino, 145-155.
54T. Reinach, s.v. "tibia,"in Darembergand Saglio, Dict. antiq. 5. 321-322, 329.
55Paus. 9.12.5, cf. Ath. 631e, and see West, GreekMusic 87.
56On the disappearanceof early fifth-centuryclassics by the end of the century, see
G. Nagy, Pindar's Homer (Baltimore 1990) 107-108, 112-115.
57On Timotheus, see Barker,Musical WritingsI, 95-97; for the passage from Phere-
crates' Chiron, see D. Restani, "I1l'Chirone' di Ferecrate e la 'nuova' musica greca.
Ricerca sul lessico retorico-musicale,"Riv.Ital. Musicol. 18 (1983) 139-192.
92 Robert W Wallace

ment,"Music complained to Justice bitterly enough about Melanippi-

des, Cinesias and Phrynis-"but Timotheusis anothermatter. My dear,
he's buriedme in a hole and scrapedme all away-it's awful!" [Justice
asks] "Who is this Timotheus?"[Music replies] "He's a red-headfrom
Miletus. The things he did to me were worse than all the others put
together,with those pervertedant-crawlingshe went in for.58And when
he found me out for a walk by myself, he untied me and undid me with
his twelve strings" ([Plut.] De mus. 1141d-1142a, trans. Barker). Yet
by the later fourth century, Timotheus had come to be regarded as
Athens' most importantlyric poet (Arist. Met. 993b). Plutarch (Phil.
11) reportsthat when Philopoemenenteredthe theatreat Mantinea,the
citharistbroughtdown the house with the first line of Timotheus'sPer-
sae. The Cnossians and the people of Priansos praise a visiting musi-
cian for performing the compositions of Timotheus, of his disciple
Polyidos, and also "of old Crete,""beautifullyand as befits an educated
man," on the cithara.59Polybius (4.20.6-9) attributesthe strength of
characterand discipline displayed by contemporaryArcadiansto their
constant instruction in the music of Timotheus and Philoxenus.
Athens' late fifth-centurymusical revolutionariesended as inspirational
classics in ruralArcadia. The presentessay has aimed to shed light on
the leaders of an earlier,more obscure revolution:Lasos, Pythocleides,
Agathokles, and Pindar. Among these great figures in early fifth-cen-
tury Greek musical experimentationwe may now include Lamprocles
"the aulete,"notwithstandinghis later relegation by Dikaios Logos to
Marathonianrespectability.

NORTHWESTERN
UNIVERSITY

58On "ant-crawlings"associated with

Agathon and new music, see Ar. Thesm. 100 and
Barker,Musical WritingsI, 95 and 109 n. 39. Barkerexplains these as "quick,decorative
figures, intricately meandering." According to the Souda (s.v.), Philoxenus was called
"ant."
59For Cnossos, see IC I 8.11 (p. 66) = CIG 3053 (post a. circ. 170 [a. C.] factum:
Guarducci);for Priansos,see IC I 24.1 (pp. 280-281).