Porphyry's Commentary on Ptolemy's Harmonics: A Greek Text and Annotated Translation

Author: Andrew Barker
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Category: Theory Of Music & Musicology, Theory Of Music & Musicology, Techniques Of Music / Music Tutorials, Techniques Of Music / Music Tutorials, Literary Studies: General, Western Philosophy: Ancient, To C 500
Book Format: Paperback

Porphyry's Commentary, the only surviving ancient commentary on a technical text, is not merely a study of Ptolemy's Harmonics. It includes virtually free-standing philosophical essays on epistemology, metaphysics, scientific methodology, aspects of the Aristotelian categories and the relations between Aristotle's views and Plato's, and a host of briefer comments on other matters of wide philosophical interest. For musicologists it is widely recognised as a treasury of quotations from earlier treatises, many of them otherwise unknown; but Porphyry's own reflections on musical concepts (for instance notes, intervals and their relation to ratios, quantitative and qualitative conceptions of pitch, the continuous and discontinuous forms of vocal movement, and so on) and his snapshots of contemporary music-making have been undeservedly neglected. This volume presents the first English translation and a revised Greek text of the Commentary, with an introduction and notes designed to assist readers in engaging with this important and intricate work.

Table Of Contents
Introduction; Text and translation: Book I; Book II.
About Andrew Barker
Andrew Barker is Emeritus Professor of Classics at the University of Birmingham. He has been researching in the field of ancient Greek music and musical theory since the 1970s, and has published six books (including The Science of Harmonics in Classical Greece (Cambridge University Press, 2007) and a great many articles on these topics. He is the Founding President of the International Society for the Study of Greek and Roman Music (Moisa), and Editor of the journal Greek and Roman Musical Studies.

(BK-9781107003859)

SKU BK-9781107003859
Barcode # 9781107003859
Brand Cambridge University Press
Artist / Author Andrew Barker
Shipping Weight 1.0000kg
Shipping Width 0.160m
Shipping Height 0.040m
Shipping Length 0.240m
Assembled Length 23.600m
Assembled Height 3.800m
Assembled Width 15.800m
Type Paperback

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