Asian shamans consider the man or animal who sacrificed the skin to construct a drum as “the Lord of the instrument”. The wand is a “knife”, now a “whip”, or it has the shape of a murderous paw or a Y, a symbol of sacrifice. On particularly solemn occasions, the Bayeke (Africa) chief throws a spear into a drum. The Giagga (Africa) considers the musical bow as the body of a girl murdered and thrown into the water. In a Kyrgyz tale, probably of Persian origin (Tuti-nameh), a monkey god, jumping from tree to tree, fell and was mortally wounded. His intestines remained stretched between two trees, and when they were dry, they rang in the wind. A hunter discovered that “instrument” imitated its principle and built the first lute. The gods of thunder preferentially incarnate in drums. The Australian rhombuses, which also reproduce the voice of thunder, are the petrified bodies of the totem gods who died following their sound sacrifices.
All the instruments Tore gave to the Ewè Pygmies (Africa) for the circumcision rites bear the name of this god. The rhombus “Ôro” is the hunting god of the African Yorubas. Suppose an instrument is called the “morning star” or is adorned with the symbols of this star. In that case, it undoubtedly embodies the cultural hero (certain Indonesian drums, the conch of Quetzalcoatl, the shöfär [horn] of the Israelites). The dual nature of these ancestors sometimes manifests itself in constructing the instruments themselves.
Among the Bhils (Asia), the hourglass drums, consisting of two human skins stretched over two cranial hemispheres welded vertex to vertex, symbolize the ancestors of humanity. Other drums have two skins, one of which is often goatskin and is struck with a stick, while the other is goatskin and is struck with the hand. Sometimes the musician identifies himself with his instrument; when he dances with the drum, he seems to be the twin brother of the instrument. The drum that appears most congenial to men and ancestors is the one in the shape of an hourglass. The Monumbo of New Guinea calls it the “human dance.” It was precisely this drum that determined the artistic anatomy of the trunk of the god Śiva. It is not easy to establish with certainty whether the bodies of the instruments represent or are the gods, but it seems certain that their voices are the voices of the gods. But these living corpses are hungry; the trumpets have a pavilion shaped like an open mouth, the flutes and rattles cry out their hunger, and the zithers and single-skinned hourglass drums show the jaws of crocodiles or whales. To satiate their hunger, they are first fed with substances that symbolize the sound of the dead; then, they are beaten to resonate in the sacrificial rite. Very often, sacred stones are placed at the bottom of the drum. In Africa, Indonesia, and Assam, skulls or jaws of the dead are placed inside this instrument. The Bena-Kanioka (Africa) close the resonance bottom of a drum with the skull cap of a man. When a new chief takes office, the Bahau build a drum in which they place the head of the old chief; they then close it with the skin of a sacrificial ox.
Among the Bayankolè, the royal drums, placed on a bed, are considered sacred cows: daily offerings of milk are made to them, and butter is obtained from the leftovers to consecrate the drums. At the time of the coronation of a new king, they are covered with new skins, which are rubbed with balls made of the blood of a young shepherd mixed with that of a cow and papyrus ashes. In Dutch New Guinea, the drum skin is glued with lime and blood from the male member. In North Asia, alcoholic beverages are poured onto scrolls or strings. However, it is not enough for the instrument to receive offers. The god’s response also depends on the quality of the instrumentalist. One day, a sorcerer Malinke (Africa), asked a blacksmith to build him a guitar.
This is not surprising when it comes to sea shells. The Algonquins (Americans) make the dance easier by beating the drums with spiraled sticks. The Dogon (Africa) winds a helical wire around the drum in the shape of an hourglass. A story from Papuago (America) tells of a bamboo (flute) in which the flutist’s ancestor moved like a snake. The Siberian shaman lifts his drum into the air, the skin facing the earth. When he beats it, the spirits or souls of the children settle in the drum in such numbers that the instrument’s weight exceeds the musician’s physical forces. Such a drum is often thought of as a chariot or sieve. Other drums are mortars or tubs, which the women use to hull the rice. Scrapers resemble rasp, cymbals to drinking cups, and timpani to cauldrons. In China, bells also served as vessels for wine. This is why one can “eat from the tambourine and drink from the cymbal,” the acoustic food of the gods. The king of musical instruments is the drum, which must be built with “pure” wood or a tree trunk struck by lightning. To make his drum, Gilgamesh used the wood intended for the construction of the throne of the goddess.
The name Ngoma, very common in East Africa to designate the drum, does not represent only the instrument but all of the music. In an orchestra, the drum is always the leader. It is “the shed of the ancestors” and is considered a living being possessing great strength. In Uganda, “eating the drum” means possessing royal power. It protects the tribe and, in case of danger, resonates by itself, without anyone touching it. He is therefore considered a great friend, and sometimes even a hut is built for him. The new drum, intended to summon supernatural forces during the Eskimos’ winter festival, shrieks or wails when it is lifted from its bearer’s shoulders and hits the ground for the first time. Like panpipes, drums form families and suggest a crowd or gathering.
At the Lango (Africa), a drum orchestra consists of seven instruments: two fathers, a mother, and four children. Those families are visited, and gifts are brought. When a drum has to leave the village, the old Batetela sheds tears as if a dead friend were buried. There is a whole “religion of the drum” in America. Suspended from four poles adorned with feathers, this instrument represents the center of the world. In India, he is worshiped as a deity. It is placed on a sofa; you wash and perfume it daily. When taken on the road, it is loaded onto an elephant (Pura-Nannuru). Each musical instrument occupies the center (navel) of the world. It is the altar on which the sonorous substance of the gods is sacrificed. The one who performs the sacrifice, and who therefore becomes guilty, expiates this action by sacrificing his strength and individuality because, playing the instrument, he “renders a service to the gods” with the action of his hands or his breath, even if this sacrifice is not as complete as that of the singer. A Californian tale tells how the lamprey emerged victorious from a musical contest because it had used its body (transformed into a flute) to play while the other animals played real instruments. The instrument sacrifices the god; singing is man’s sacrifice. All the other symbols spring from this metaphysical value of singing and instruments. Since they produce a transfer or an exchange of forces, they are primarily means of transport. Australian diamonds often bear designs that symbolize the “journeys” made by the gods, both during creation and during rituals. The shaman’s drum is considered a sled, a reindeer, a horse, or a goose, which he uses to “fly” to the sky. Compared to the Big Dipper, the earthly “chariot” revolves around the tree of life and death, that is, around the “sacrificial pole,” which is the world’s axis.
The harp is now a boat now a swan carrying souls. The Papuans call their flutes birds. The rattles are often adorned with feathers or clearly betray the shape of a bird. Like the drums, hymns are chariots or boats where the gods embark on their sacrificial journeys. The expression “carrying a song” or “pulling a song” is widespread among primitive peoples, but it is no less common in great civilizations. The tunes of the Brhat and Rathamtara are the two vessels that carry the sacrifice across. As one gets on a vessel, one gets on hymns (Aitareya Brahmana). The shaman’s circular drum is also a shooting bow which, since it performs the sound sacrifice, “is the whole world”, “it is the whole world”. The sacrifice is the world. Among the Scior of Altai, this instrument bears a certain number of designs: the owner of a Scior drum explained to L.P. Potapov how the upper part of the world picture painted on the drum scroll depicts the sky, and the lower part corresponds to the underworld.
Seven pieces of metal symbolize the Big Dipper. The edge of the celestial part is equipped with six horns used by the shaman to defend himself from evil spirits. From the six holes in the drum handle enters the “six-eyed tiger”, ready to rescue the shaman during his flight through the skies. Let us, therefore, see how the humid and luminous music, born of the eternal waters following a cry, a gust of wind, or a thunder, is the work of the gods or the dead. Each singer and each instrument is a living corpse and expresses the dualism of cosmic forces. Perhaps it is not useless to quote a passage from Aegidius Zamorensis, which shows us that such ideas also once existed in Europe. Disserting the problem of the invention of music, this medieval theorist affirms that some would like to derive music “from the agitation of the winds in the hollows of the forests, where whistling is heard, especially at night: others, from the sound of the waters and the tearing of the air against the rocks or rocky sites: whence that voice similar to the voice of copious waters”; others, from the impetuous motion of the peripheral regions and their revolution, as happens, in a certain way, under the ardor of the sun, starting from the outskirts of Toledo; still others, from the fibers, stretched in the flesh of the corpses as well as from the bones laid bare – especially in running water or elsewhere – as soon as they are touched”.
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