Aristoxenus of Tarentum (; born 375,

fl. ''Floruit'' ( ; usually abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for 'flourished') denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indic ...

335 BC) was a

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

Peripatetic

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

, and a pupil of

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

. Most of his writings, which dealt with

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

ethics Ethics is the philosophy, philosophical study of Morality, moral phenomena. Also called moral philosophy, it investigates Normativity, normative questions about what people ought to do or which behavior is morally right. Its main branches inclu ...

and

music Music is the arrangement of sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm, or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Music is generally agreed to be a cultural universal that is present in all hum ...

, have been lost, but one musical treatise, ''Elements of Harmony'' (Greek: ;

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

: ''

Elementa harmonica ''Elementa harmonica'' (''Ἁρμονικὰ στοιχεῖα'' in Greek; ''Elements of Harmonics'' in English) is a treatise on the subject of musical scales by Aristoxenus, of which considerable amounts are extant. The work dates to the secon ...

''), survives incomplete, as well as some fragments concerning

rhythm Rhythm (from Greek , ''rhythmos'', "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a " movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular r ...

and

meter The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of ...

. The ''Elements'' is the chief source of our knowledge of

ancient Greek music Music was almost universally present in ancient Greek society, from marriages, funerals, and religious ceremonies to theatre, folk music, and the ballad-like reciting of epic poetry. This played an integral role in the lives of ancient Greeks. ...

Life

Aristoxenus was born at Tarentum (in modern-day

Apulia Apulia ( ), also known by its Italian language, Italian name Puglia (), is a Regions of Italy, region of Italy, located in the Southern Italy, southern peninsular section of the country, bordering the Adriatic Sea to the east, the Strait of Ot ...

, southern Italy) in

Magna Graecia Magna Graecia refers to the Greek-speaking areas of southern Italy, encompassing the modern Regions of Italy, Italian regions of Calabria, Apulia, Basilicata, Campania, and Sicily. These regions were Greek colonisation, extensively settled by G ...

, and was the son of a learned musician named Spintharus (otherwise Mnesias). He learned music from his father, and having then been instructed by

Lamprus of Erythrae Lamprus of Erythrae or Lamprus of Athens () was an ancient Greek musician with excellent skill at the playing of the lyre. H. W. Garrod Life Lamprus was born in Athens Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns i ...

and Xenophilus the Pythagorean, he finally became a pupil of

, whom he appears to have rivaled in the variety of his studies. According to the ''

Suda The ''Suda'' or ''Souda'' (; ; ) is a large 10th-century Byzantine Empire, Byzantine encyclopedia of the History of the Mediterranean region, ancient Mediterranean world, formerly attributed to an author called Soudas () or Souidas (). It is an ...

'', he heaped insults on Aristotle after his death, because Aristotle had designated

Theophrastus Theophrastus (; ; c. 371 – c. 287 BC) was an ancient Greek Philosophy, philosopher and Natural history, naturalist. A native of Eresos in Lesbos, he was Aristotle's close colleague and successor as head of the Lyceum (classical), Lyceum, the ...

as the next

head A head is the part of an organism which usually includes the ears, brain, forehead, cheeks, chin, eyes, nose, and mouth, each of which aid in various sensory functions such as sight, hearing, smell, and taste. Some very simple ani ...

of the

Peripatetic school The Peripatetic school ( ) was a philosophical school founded in 335 BC by Aristotle in the Lyceum in ancient Athens. It was an informal institution whose members conducted philosophical and scientific inquiries. The school fell into decline afte ...

, a position which Aristoxenus himself had coveted, having achieved great distinction as a pupil of Aristotle. This story is, however, contradicted by Aristocles, who asserts that he only ever mentioned Aristotle with the greatest respect. Nothing is known of his life after the time of Aristotle's departure, apart from a comment in ''Elementa Harmonica'' concerning his works.

Overview of his works

His writings were said to have consisted of four hundred and fifty-three books, and dealt with

and

. Although his final years were in the

, and he hoped to succeed Aristotle on his death, Aristoxenus was strongly influenced by

Pythagoreanism Pythagoreanism originated in the 6th century BC, based on and around the teachings and beliefs held by Pythagoras and his followers, the Pythagoreans. Pythagoras established the first Pythagorean community in the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek co ...

, and was only a follower of Aristotle in so far as Aristotle was a follower of

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

and

Pythagoras Pythagoras of Samos (; BC) was an ancient Ionian Greek philosopher, polymath, and the eponymous founder of Pythagoreanism. His political and religious teachings were well known in Magna Graecia and influenced the philosophies of P ...

. Thus, as Gibson tells us: "the various philosophical influences" on Aristoxenus included growing up in the profoundly Pythagorean city of Taras (Tarentum), home also of the two Pythagoreans

Archytas Archytas (; ; 435/410–360/350 BC) was an Ancient Greek mathematician, music theorist, statesman, and strategist from the ancient city of Taras (Tarentum) in Southern Italy. He was a scientist and philosopher affiliated with the Pythagorean ...

and

Philolaus Philolaus (; , ''Philólaos''; ) was a Greek Pythagorean and pre-Socratic philosopher. He was born in a Greek colony in Italy and migrated to Greece. Philolaus has been called one of three most prominent figures in the Pythagorean tradition and ...

, and his father's (Pythagorean) musical background, which he inculcated into his son. Gibson tells us that, after the influence of his father: However, Aristoxenus disagreed with earlier Pythagorean musical theory in several respects, building on their work with ideas of his own. The only work of his that has come down to us is the three books of the ''Elements of Harmony'', an incomplete musical treatise. Aristoxenus' theory had an empirical tendency; in music he held that the notes of the scale are to be judged, not as earlier Pythagoreans had believed, by mathematical ratio, but by the ear.

Vitruvius Vitruvius ( ; ; –70 BC – after ) was a Roman architect and engineer during the 1st century BC, known for his multi-volume work titled . As the only treatise on architecture to survive from antiquity, it has been regarded since the Renaissan ...

in his ''

De architectura (''On architecture'', published as ''Ten Books on Architecture'') is a treatise on architecture written by the Ancient Rome, Roman architect and military engineer Vitruvius, Marcus Vitruvius Pollio and dedicated to his patron, the emperor Caesa ...

'' paraphrases the writings of Aristoxenus on music. His ideas were responded to and developed by some later theorists such as

Archestratus Archestratus ( ''Archestratos'') was an ancient Greek poet of Gela or Syracuse, Magna Graecia, in Sicily, who wrote some time in the mid 4th century BCE, and was known as "the Daedalus of tasty dishes". His humorous didactic poem ''Hedypatheia ...

, and his place in the methodological debate between rationalists and empiricists was commented upon by such writers as Ptolemais of Cyrene. The Pythagorean theory that the

soul The soul is the purported Mind–body dualism, immaterial aspect or essence of a Outline of life forms, living being. It is typically believed to be Immortality, immortal and to exist apart from the material world. The three main theories that ...

is a 'harmony' of the

four elements The classical elements typically refer to earth, water, air, fire, and (later) aether which were proposed to explain the nature and complexity of all matter in terms of simpler substances. Ancient cultures in Greece, Angola, Tibet, India, a ...

composing the body, and therefore mortal ("nothing at all," in the words of

Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, orator, writer and Academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises tha ...

), was ascribed to Aristoxenus (fr. 118–121 Wehrli) and

Dicaearchus Dicaearchus of Messana (; ''Dikaiarkhos''; ), also written Dikaiarchos (), was a Greek philosopher, geographer and author. Dicaearchus was a student of Aristotle in the Lyceum. Very little of his work remains extant. He wrote on geography and t ...

. This theory is comparable to the one offered by Simmias in Plato's ''Phaedo''.

''Elementa harmonica''

In his '' Elements of Harmony'' (also ''Harmonics''), Aristoxenus attempted a complete and systematic exposition of

. The first book contains an explanation of the

genera Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family as used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial s ...

Greek music The music of Greece is as diverse and celebrated as its History of Greece, history. Greek music separates into two parts: Greek folk music, Greek traditional music and Byzantine music. These compositions have existed for millennia: they originat ...

, and also of their

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

; this is followed by some general definitions of terms, particularly those of

sound In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid. In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' by the br ...

, interval, and

system A system is a group of interacting or interrelated elements that act according to a set of rules to form a unified whole. A system, surrounded and influenced by its open system (systems theory), environment, is described by its boundaries, str ...

. In the second book Aristoxenus divides music into seven parts, which he takes to be: the genera, intervals, sounds, systems, tones or modes, mutations, and ''melopoeia''. The remainder of the work is taken up with a discussion of the many parts of music according to the order which he had himself prescribed. While it is often held among modern scholars that Aristoxenus rejected the opinion of the

Pythagoreans Pythagoreanism originated in the 6th century BC, based on and around the teachings and beliefs held by Pythagoras and his followers, the Pythagoreans. Pythagoras established the first Pythagorean community in the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek co ...

that arithmetic rules were the ultimate judge of intervals and that in every system there must be found a mathematical coincidence before such a system can be said to be harmonic, Aristoxenus made extensive use of arithmetic terminology, notably to define varieties of

semitone A semitone, also called a minor second, half step, or a half tone, is the smallest musical interval commonly used in Western tonal music, and it is considered the most dissonant when sounded harmonically. It is defined as the interval between ...

s and dieses in his descriptions of the various genera. In his second book he asserted that "by the hearing we judge of the magnitude of an interval, and by the understanding we consider its many powers." And further he wrote, "that the nature of melody is best discovered by the perception of sense, and is retained by memory; and that there is no other way of arriving at the knowledge of music;" and though, he wrote, "others affirm that it is by the study of instruments that we attain this knowledge;" this, he wrote, is talking wildly, "for just as it is not necessary for him who writes an Iambic to attend to the arithmetical proportions of the feet of which it is composed, so it is not necessary for him who writes a Phrygian song to attend to the ratios of the sounds proper thereto." However, this should not be construed as meaning that he postulated a simplistic system of harmony resembling that of modern twelve tone theory, and especially not an equally tempered system. As he urges us to consider, "(a)fter all, with which of the people who argue about the shades of the

should one agree? Not everyone looks to the same division when tuning the

chromatic Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are used to characterize scales. The terms are also applied to musical instruments, intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, es ...

or the

enharmonic In music, two written notes have enharmonic equivalence if they produce the same pitch but are notated differently. Similarly, written intervals, chords, or key signatures are considered enharmonic if they represent identical pitches that ar ...

, so why should the note a ditone from mesé be called lichanos rather than a small amount higher?" It is sometimes claimed that the nature of Aristoxenus' scales and genera deviated sharply from his predecessors. That Aristoxenus used a model for creating scales based upon the notion of a topos, or range of pitch location, is fact, but there is no reason to believe that he alone set this precedent as he himself does not make this claim. Indeed, the idea of unfixed pitch locations that cover certain ranges, the limits of which may be defined by fixed points, is a notion that was popular until the modern fixation upon fixed pitch systems, as is indicated by Baroque theoretical systems of pitch and intonation. Another way of stating this, however perhaps less accurate, is that instead of using discrete ratios to place intervals, he used continuously variable quantities. The postulation that this resulted in the structuring of his tetrachords and the resulting scales having 'other' qualities of consonance is one that can only be accounted for by the recourse to often repeated inconsistencies amongst his interpreters and modern confirmation bias in favour of simplified twelve tone theories. Aristoxenus himself held that "... two things must not be overlooked: First, that many people have mistakenly supposed us to be saying that a tone can be divided into three equal parts in a melody. They made this mistake because they did not realise that it is one thing to employ the third part of a tone, and another to divide a tone into three parts and sing all three. Secondly we accept that from a purely abstract point of view there is no least interval." In book three Aristoxenus goes on to describe twenty eight laws of melodic succession, which are of great interest to those concerned with classical Greek melodic structure.

On rhythmics and metrics

Part of the second book of a work on rhythmics and metrics, ''Elementa rhythmica'', is preserved in medieval manuscript tradition. Aristoxenus was also the author of a work ''On the Primary Duration'' (''chronos''). A five-column fragment of a treatise on meter ( P. Oxy. 9) was published in Grenfell and

Hunt Hunting is the Human activity, human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products (fur/hide (sk ...

's ''

Oxyrhynchus Papyri The Oxyrhynchus Papyri are a group of manuscripts discovered during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by papyrology, papyrologists Bernard Pyne Grenfell and Arthur Surridge Hunt at an ancient Landfill, rubbish dump near Oxyrhync ...

'', vol. 1 (1898) and is probably by Aristoxenus.

Other works

The edition of Wehrli presents the surviving evidence for works with the following titles (not including several fragments of uncertain origin): * ''Life of Pythagoras'' (): fr. 11 Wehrli * ''On Pythagoras and his pupils'' (): fr. 14 Wehrli * ''On the Pythagorean life'' (): fr. 31 Wehrli * ''Pythagorean maxims'' or ''Pythagorean negations'' (): fr. 34 Wehrli * ''Educational customs'' or ''Rules of education'' (): fr. 42–43 Wehrli * ''Political laws'' (): fr. 44–45 Wehrli * ''Mantinean character'' (): fr. 45, I, lines 1–9 Wehrli * ''Praise of Mantineans'' (): fr. 45, I, lines 10–12 Wehrli * ''Life of

'' (): fr. 47–50 Wehrli * ''Life of

Socrates Socrates (; ; – 399 BC) was a Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher from Classical Athens, Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and as among the first moral philosophers of the Ethics, ethical tradition ...

'' (): fr. 54 Wehrli * ''Life of Plato'' (): fr. 64 Wehrli * ''On tonoi'' (): a brief quotation in Porphyry'
commentary
on Ptolemy's ''Harmonics'', p. 78 Düring (not edited by Wehrli) * ''On music'' (): fr. 80, 82, 89 Wehrli * ''On listening to music'' or ''Lecture course on music'' (): fr. 90 Wehrli * ''On Praxidamas'' (): fr. 91 Wehrli * ''On melodic composition'' or ''On music in lyric poetry'' (): fr. 93 Wehrli * ''On musical instruments'' (): fr. 94–95, 102 Wehrli * ''On

aulos An ''aulos'' (plural ''auloi''; , plural ) or ''tibia'' (Latin) was a wind instrument in ancient Greece, often depicted in art and also attested by archaeology. Though the word ''aulos'' is often translated as "flute" or as " double flute", ...

'' (): fr. 96 Wehrli * ''On auletes'' (): fr. 100 Wehrli * ''On the boring of aulos'' (): fr. 101 Wehrli * ''On choruses'' (): fr. 103 Wehrli * ''On tragic dancing'' (): fr. 104–106 Wehrli * ''Comparisons of dances'' (): fr. 109 Wehrli * ''On tragic poets'' (): fr. 113 Wehrli * ''Life of Telestes'' (): fr. 117 Wehrli (according to whom this Telestes is the

dithyramb The dithyramb (; , ''dithyrambos'') was an ancient Greek hymn sung and danced in honor of Dionysus, the god of wine and fertility; the term was also used as an epithet of the god. Plato, in '' The Laws'', while discussing various kinds of music m ...

ic poet) * ''Miscellaneous table talk'' or '' Sympotic miscellany'' (): fr. 124 Wehrli * ''Notes'' or ''Memorabilia'' (), ''Historical notes'' (Ἱστορικὰ ὑπομνήματα), ''Brief notes'' (), ''Miscellaneous notes'' (), ''Random jottings'' (): fr. 128–132, 139 Wehrli

Editions and translations

* Barker, Andrew (1989). ''Greek Musical Writings'', vol. 2: ''Harmonic and Acoustic Theory'' (Cambridge), pp. 119–89, English translation with introduction and notes, * Macran, Henry Stewart (1902). ''The Harmonics of Aristoxenus'' (Oxford), Greek text with English translation and notes
archive.orgInternet Archive
* Marquard, Paul (1868). ''Die harmonischen Fragmente des Aristoxenus'' (Berlin), Greek text with German translation and commentary
archive.orgGoogle Books
* Pearson, Lionel (1990). ''Aristoxenus: Elementa rhythmica. The fragment of Book II and the additional evidence for Aristoxenean rhythmic theory'' (Oxford ), Greek texts with introduction, translation, and commentary, * Wehrli, Fritz (1967). ''Die Schule des Aristoteles'', vol. 2: ''Aristoxenos'', 2nd. ed. (Basel/Stuttgart), Greek text (excluding the harmonic fragments, rhythmic fragments, ''On the Primary Duration'', and ''On tonoi'': see p. 28) with commentary in German * Westphal, Rudolf (1883–1893). ''Aristoxenus von Tarent: Melik und Rhythmik des classischen Hellenenthums'', 2 vols. (Leipzig)
vol. 1vol. 2
* Westphal, Rudolf (1861). ''Die Fragmente und die Lehrsätze der griechischen Rhythmiker'' (Leipzig), pp. 26–41, Greek text of ''Elementa rhythmica'' and ''On the Primary Duration''
Internet Archive

Notes

References

* *

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Aristoxenus 4th-century BC Greek philosophers Ancient Greek biographers Ancient Greek ethicists Ancient Greek music theorists Ancient Greek musicologists Ancient Greek philosophers of art Ancient Tarantines Natural philosophers Peripatetic philosophers Philosophers of Magna Graecia Philosophers of music Pythagoreans of Magna Graecia Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown Metic philosophers in Classical Athens