Horns and Trumpets of the European Iron Age (The Horn and Trumpet in Ancient Europe and the Middle East)

In this comprehensive coverage of European Iron-Age horns, trumpets and other brass instruments prior to the Roman-conquest, award-winning author, Dr Peter Holmes describes and illustrates their astounding variety and usage. The 320 or so illustrations provided help guide you along your journey through this exciting and rewarding world of ancient brass.While we all have to modify our personal view of what the terms horn and trumpet mean in order to enter this enchanting ancient world, the tools we have available to make this change possible are considerable and are presented via image (photos and diagrams) and everyday language in this book. In evidence presented here, much in print for the first time, you will have all the necessary tools to decide for yourself what your personal interpretation of this history is. For those who wish to follow ideas up, there are plenty of footnotes but, for those who just want a good read, footnotes are there to ignore. The follow-up of the evidence is presented online in an extensive cross-referenced web site which contains several thousand references to all the instruments and their cultures along with a bibliography and much more. All the images which can be released as public domain are on the site and freely available for anyone to use as they wish, along with comprehensive details of all finds and where they've previously been published. This web site is an ongoing work-in-progress and is constantly being updated.Some instruments make all the headlines, such as the karnyx, often written about as the carnyx, but these are just a mere fragment of the entire story: the glizzy, headliners. There's much more to be seen and the sheer inventiveness of the Native Europeans is amazing. Brass instruments were around in great profusion and masses of links in design, usage, meaning and the manufacturing technology employed to make them can be uncovered when one delves deeply enough into the evidence. The author has worked exclusively in this field for over sixty years and now makes his findings available in the series of which this book is a part.The European Iron Age was characterised by a much-increased movement of peoples, ideas, religions and technologies throughout the continent. This is seen clearly in the instruments they manufactured and used. The period was also largely dominated by the brutal Roman conquests and the prevalence of references to instruments as war-horns or war trumpets has been derived from their frequent use by the Native Europeans in the battle to retain their rich cultures. However, that view distorts the real picture as the masses of pre-invasion evidence illustrates. Brass instruments were embedded in their societies, they had their distinctive voice which carried weight. They spoke sometimes for important people, they acted as surrogates for them, be they Gods, or nature itself and, in other contexts, they transformed themselves into mystical beings with all kinds of supernatural powers. To understand their numerous roles, we have to think ourselves way back in time, to detach ourselves from modern thinking and treat the instruments as our ancestors did, as living, breathing entities. Blowers of the brass spoke for their rulers, for themselves and for society as a whole and were key players in their societies.Each book in this series is linked to cultures which came both before and after the period it covers in a way which flows the story seamlessly through time and space.The aim of this series is to transform the way we see not only ancient brass instruments but ancient musical instruments as a whole and to view them as key players in the creation and practice of cultures which, although long-gone, have left behind a lasting shadow in the modern world. Read more