Number symbolism in the Renaissance Lute Rose

beb eal WMEADLAM WELLS J & . \a à \ Number symbolism in the renaissance lute rose Robin Headlam Wells In this article Robin Headlam Wells argues that the renais- The vision of day and night and of months and circling sance luthier adapted the decorative motifs which his instru- years has created the art of Number and given us not only ment inherited from its Islamic origins in order to express the the notion of time, but also the means of research into the Plato. Timaeus idea of harmony. Despite their apparent variety most renats- nature of the Universe. sance lute roses are based on two figures: the hexagram and the tetragram. According to the familiar body of Pythagorean In a seminal article on the construction of renaisdoctrine transmitted through Plato to the Middle Ages and sance and baroque lutes’ Friedemann Hellwig the Renaissance, the numbers six and four were ofprofound pointed out that the enormous number of different significance. The author here suggests that, as the renais- rose patterns which characterize the lutes of this sance cosmographer represented the idea of a harmonious period can be reduced to a few basic motifs. The universe by means of number expressed diagrammatically, so most frequent of these, he claims, is the six-pointed the luthier employed geometry to symbolize the principle of star formed by the interlacing of two equilateral triangles (see illus. 1). Such a design, Hellwig discordia concors.

Number Symbolism in the Renaissance Lute Rose Author(s): Robin Headlam Wells Source: Early Music, Vol. 9, No. 1, Plucked-String Issue 1 (Jan., 1981), pp. 32-42 Published by: Oxford University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3126588 Accessed: 11/11/2009 08:22 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=oup. 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. Oxford University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Early Music. http://www.jstor.org

Number symbolismin lute renaissance the rose RobinHeadlamWells t , ;= L -, N - : o - ,A A Concertby Lorenzo Costa (London, National Gallery) In this article Robin Headlam Wells argues that the renaissance luthier adapted the decorativemotifs which his instrument inheritedfrom its Islamic originsin orderto expressthe idea of harmony.Despite their apparent variety most renaissance lute roses are based on twofigures: the hexagramand the tetragram.Accordingto thefamiliar bodyof Pythagorean doctrine transmittedthrough Plato to the Middle Ages and the Renaissance,the numberssix and four were of profound significance. The author here suggests that, as the renaissance cosmographerrepresented the idea of a harmonious universe by means of numberexpresseddiagrammatically,so the luthier employedgeometryto symbolizethe principle of discordia concors. 32 EARLY MUSIC JANUARY 1981 The vision of day and night and of months and circling years has created the art of Number and given us not only the notion of time, but also the means of research into the nature of the Universe. Plato, Timaeus In a seminal article on the construction of renaissance and baroque lutes' Friedemann Hellwig pointed out that the enormous number of different rose patterns which characterize the lutes of this period can be reduced to a few basic motifs. The most frequent of these, he claims, is the six-pointed star formed by the interlacing of two equilateral triangles (see illus. 1). Such a design, Hellwig

suggests, may have been intended to symbolize 'the permeation of the visible and invisible world'.2 The suggestion is not implausible: indeed it would be surprising if the geometrical intricacies of the typical renaissance lute rose did not conceal a symbolic meaning of one kind or another. It was, after all, the product of an age whose passion for the arcane reflected itself in pageantry, in emblem books, in The Basseswere the Earthand Ocean, The Trebleshrill the Aire: the other Strings The vnlike Bodies were of mixed things: And then His Hand to breake sweete Notes began.4 At a time when the essential function of art was conceived as being 'to lead and draw us to as high a perfection, as our degenerate soules made worse by their clay-lodgings, can be capable of',5 ornament had a vital role to play in the techniques of moral persuasion. How can poetry, asks the Elizabethan critic George Puttenham, 'shew it selfe either gallant or gorgious, if any lymme be left naked and bare and not clad in his kindly clothes and colours ... ?'6 The lute rose provided a unique opportunity for artistic invention; that the possibilities it afforded for expressing symbolic meanings should have been neglected is unlikely. In this article I hope to show that the typical renaissance lute rose was designed to express a symbolic meaning which was at once complex and extremely precise.7 From the discussion which follows it will be clear, however, that a single article can hope to do no more than touch the surface of a very large subject. ' . r iuB * .' - . I Rose with six-pointed star, from R. Wyssenbach, Tablaturauf di Lutten(Zurich, 1550) allegorical portraiture, in architectural conceits, in literary puzzles and conundrums and in number symbolism of all kinds. Moreover the lute itself, as the noblest of musical instruments,3 was widely treated as a symbol of the harmony which underlies the cosmos. William Drummond, for example, elaborates this familiar conceit in the manner of an emblembook writer: GODbinding with hid Tendonsthis great ALL, Did make a LVTEwhich had all parts it giuen; This LVTESround Belliewas the azur'd Heauen, The Rosethose lights which Hee did there install; 2 Gothic rose from a cittern in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London Unlike most of its wire-strung relatives, whose roses were usually of gothic design (illus. 2),8 the lute retained the geometric motifs of its Arabic origins. Basing his designs on a few simple forms such as the sphere, the triangle and the square, the Islamic artist

3 Rose from a 16th-century Italian lute in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna 4 Rosette from a pair of wooden doors in an Angoran mosque, from H. Gluiickand E. Diez, Die KunstdesIslam(Berlin, 1925) 5 Late 15th-century Egyptian bronze bowl, from Glick and Diez, op cit 6 Detail from a ceramic wall decoration in the Alhambra, Spain. Reproduced by permission from E. Garcia-Gomez, L'Alhambra: developed a highly sophisticated system of symbolism whose purpose was to reveal the hidden laws in the ubiquitous Islamic rosette, a design which is found in countries as widely separated geographically as Turkey, Egypt and Spain (see illus. 4-6). By repeating an infinitely extendible geometrical motif the artist gives us, in effect, an incomplete picture of a pattern which exists only in infinity.10In this way he is able to suggest the idea, fundamental to Islam, that of the universe.9 The characteristic idiom of this symbolic language was a complex geometrical pattern interwoven with floral arabesques. The interlacing strapwork which is a feature of most renaissance lute and archlute roses (illus. 3) has its origins il Palazzo Reale (Florence, 1965)

man is a transient being whose earthly existence must be seen as part of unified eternal order. The renaissance luthier thus inherited a form of geometrical decoration whose original purpose was essentially symbolic. But he also inherited, from the European Middle Ages, a tradition, parallel in many respects to that of Islam, of representing the cosmos by means of number expressed diagrammatically. Fundamental to the renaissance outlook is the idea of harmony." According to the body of Pythagorean doctrine transmitted through Plato to the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, the endless variety of the 7 The harmony of the universe, from R. Fludd, Utriusque cosmi majons scilicet et mions metaphysica, physica atque technica historna (Oppenheim, 1617-19) universe was no chaotic melange, but a rational system of identical structures in which each part had its proper place and was related both to the whole and to every part. This fitting together of discrete parts in a complex whole is what is originally meant by harmonia.'2 If harmony is the unseen and unheard principle of order which underlies the cosmos, the metonym by which the universe is represented as a musical instrument becomes inevitable (illus. 7 is a well-known example of this favourite renaissance conceit). It means, too, that the six-pointed star, which Hellwig claims is the motif most frequently used by renaissance luthiers in their rose designs, probably has a more precise significance than he suggests, for six is the number of harmony. The idea that number is the principle which governs the creation is the distinguishing feature of Pythagoreanism as an intellectual system. This is not the place to attempt a summary of Pythagorean number symbolism;13 what must be emphasized, however, is that this body of doctrine can in no sense be described as esoteric: on the contrary, there is scarcely a major classical philosopher or Church Father whose thinking was not coloured by Pythagorean principles.14 The study of numbers formed the very basis of the medieval quadrivium;'5in providing man with a means of plumbing the mysteries of the universe and so of appreciating the moral beauty of the divine plan, numbers possessed an important ethical value.'6 In the Renaissance, Pythagoras himself came to be regarded as a type of that humanist ideal of moderation which combined piety with practical wisdom. Since medieval and renaissance thought is so thoroughly imbued with the spirit of Pythagoreanism it is not surprising to find that the greatest and most characteristic literary monuments of the time bear eloquent testimony to the belief that 'all things are made. .. of Numbers; the heavens, earth, sea, the soule and body of man, yea, the Angels themselves...'.17 It has long been recognized by literary scholars that number symbolism is as fundamental to The Faerie Queene'8-one of the last great expressions of the idea of cosmos-as it was to the Divina Commedia'9some 300 years earlier. In organizing the structure of their poems in accordance with certain universally understood numerological principles, Dante and Spenser reflect the fact that number lore was central to medieval and renaissance cosmology. When the renaissance luthier made the hexagram the central feature of his rose design we may reasonably conclude that he did so with some awareness of its special significance. According to Macrobius six is 'a number with various and manifold honors and abilities . .'.20 It owes its peculiar distinction to the fact that, as the sum of its aliquot parts (1+2+3), it EARLY MUSIC JANITARY

I 9 and 10 Roses of two chittaroni in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London 8 Primitive Africanrebab decorated with a six-pointed star, in the KunsthistorischesMuseum, Vienna was regarded as the first perfect number. 'The Number of six', writes Ingpen, 'is every way full, perfect, divine . ..'.21 Its identification with harmony is probably due to the fact that six is the number of intervalsin the Greek scale.22 It may be seen, then, that the ancient device of the hexagram, still to be found in musical instruments 36 EARLY MUSIC JANUARY 1981 like the African rebab (illus. 8), is a fitting symbol to incorporate in a musical instrument which was itself adopted as an image of a harmonious universe. While its form, consisting of two interpenetrating triangles, signifies the union of the human and the divine, the corporeal and the spiritual, the visible and the invisible, its numerical significance suggests the

also appears a quadrilateral figure. Which of these two motifs is first perceived depends, as in the reversing figure used by psychologists, on >^0^^^ yf// ^^J^^tfamiliar the mental set of the observer. The roses of two early chittaroni in the Victoria and Albert 1\\7th-century /// Museum may serve as typical examples (illus. 9 and 10). Despite the obvious differences in the treatment of their arabesques, the same geometrical pattern is from whichever of the eight cardinal points B \\g/// \\// e!present: of the U compass the roses are viewed the eye perceives )x\& either a hexagram (illus. 11) or a rectangular figure which divides the circle into four main compartments (illus. 12). Now the number four is of paramount significance, for it is the very basis of the Pythagorean cosmos. 'All the foundation of every deepe studie and invention', wrote La Primaudaye, 'must be settled upon the number fower, because it is the roote and beginning of all numbers.'23 The fourth integer provided a key to the cosmos because it embraced the four elements, the four seasons, the four ages of man and the four bodily humours. Each of these systems was related to the others in a completely integrated whole. The harmony of the cosmos depended upon the nature of the relationship between the four elements. In its simplest form this stable union of ' ' four conflicting elements was represented as four j I/..7 \%\ \\ j j interlocking piec.'^ ontc Although Hellw~~~igis,o ore igh h^^sN8^3S of in prevalene thehexagra easaclrsV^^^^*"^^ it shou~~ld designs, epirtdottat byteIae,^ 16th century~it a e o eu u lf rt is oi ob harmony of which it was in a real sense the mouthpiece. Although Hellwig is, of course, right to notice the prevalence of the hexagram in renaissance rose designs, it should be pointed out that by the later 16th century it had become usual for this motif to be assimilated to a more complex pattern in which there , ta . circles (illus. 13), and derivations W y Sy^ ^ r m Iioeo Svle ie .^ of this >y ! ersosoem nie 13 Tetrad from Isidore of Seville, Liber de responsione mundi et astrorumordinatione (Atigsburg, 1472)

14 Rose from a lute by Hieber in the Conservatoire Royal de Musique, Brussels 15 Rose from an early 16th-centurv lute in the collection of Laurence Witten, Southport, Connecticut. By kind permission of the owner. motif are frequently found in lute roses either as a simple quatrefoil (illus. 14) or, in a more stylized form, as a series of interlocking quadrangles (illus. 15). Although it is unusual to find a rose whose geometry is unrelieved by arabesques, this pattern of interlocking quadrangles is in fact extremely widespread, and, as illus. 16 shows, it often forms the basis of roses which have lost all trace of geometrical strapwork. The inherent stability of the cosmos was explained by the fact that the four elements were bound together in a tetrad, that is to say a configuration of two pairs of opposites linked together by their two mean terms. This arrangement was the principle upon which God had created the universe. The clearest account of the way the four elements are united in a tetradic relationship by their mean terms is by Macrobius (fl AD400). Macrobius was one of a group of neo-Platonists whose ideas exercised a seminal influence on medieval thought. In his Commentaryon the Dream of Scipio Macrobius explains that the Creator gave to each of the elements two qualities, one of which it shared with the element closest to it in character. Thus, moist and warm and, although opposed to water, the cold to the warm, nevertheless has the common bond of moisture. Moreover, fire, being hot and dry, spurns the moisture of the air, but yet adheres to it because of the warmth in both. And so it happens that each one of the elements appears to embrace the two elements bordering on each side of it by single qualities: water binds earth to itself by coldness, and air by moisture; air is allied to water by its moisture, and to fire by warmth; fire mingles with air because of its heat, and with earth because of its dryness; earth is compatible with fire because of its dryness, and with water because of its coldness. These different bonds would have no tenacity, however, if there were only two elements; if there were three the union would be but a weak one; but as there are four elements the bonds are unbreakable, since the two extremes are held together by two means.24 Earth is dry and cold, and water cold and moist; but although these two elements are opposed, the dry to the wet, they have a common bond in their coldness. Air is 38 EARLY MUSIC JANUARY 1981 The same idea is reflected in John Norden's Vicissitudo Rerum (London, 1600). In answer to the question why discord is essential to the harmony of the cosmos, Norden explains (stanza 85) that if the mutually antagonistic elements were not kept in check by one another the result would be an imbalance in nature: must bee set, Yet thus, this disagreement As in the discordbee no power to wrong: For why? supremest have no fatall let, But will preuaile, as they become too strong.

16 Rose based on one from a damaged instrument by Graill in the Museo Bardini, Florence. Reconstruction by Phil Lourie Therefore such meane must them be set among, As though things bee compact of contraryes, They must by ballance, have like quantities. The tetrad, then, is the principle upon which depends the concord and harmony of the cosmos. It was commonly represented by renaissance cosmographers with great precision in diagrammatic form. In illus. 17 the elements are arranged at equal intervals round the circumference of a circle. Between them are their four qualities, which, acting as mean terms, serve to bind the warring elements together in a stable union. By a network of intersecting lines the extremely complex nature of the relationships within the tetrad is illustrated. The luthier who pierced the belly of his instrument with a design similar in many respects to the cosmographer's diagram of the universe could hardly be unaware of the fact that the geometry he employed was a key which could reveal the mystery of the cosmos. Indeed examples of geometry employed for symbolic purposes were available to him in glorious profusion not only in the Arab world, but in every major city in Europe. For as Painton Cowen argues in his magnificent study of medieval cathedral windows, 'Every rose window is a symbol and image of ... the created universe'25 (see illus. 18). It has already been noted that the number four owed its peculiar distinction to the fact that it repre- 17 Tetrad from Oronce Fine, Protomathesis (Paris, 1532) sented both the macrocosm (the universe as a whole) and the microcosm (man himself). This analogy was an essential feature of the Pythagorean system and it too was commonly represented in diagrammatic form. Illus. 19 shows how the four elements have their counterparts in the four seasons and the four bodily humours. In this case we may note that the

'':,^ ; -.:,c A \/ S^^< 'sA / J/A'>^A^ \ <, ra , t AX>,--t -.* > ,,* \" Ss) R ^A^^ ^?' .-/~>-' ,^"\ ?\:.> -,7% ^sections, t-n t>62R5); r\)r/"'^ ~/-, \/\S, ^has ^^ must be seen as part of an endless cycle of time is sj > ' ;.: pictorially in illus. 20 where the twelve ;iexpressed months of are each identified with a i.>^/ 54 )/'\ y"S' < \ /human ffi : S A >\zf v . ncosm '~:,> z ;(in ':'f--"^s o; ~/ ~/~ \ ^geometric 18 Rose window in the north transept of ChartresCathedral. 'Its divine geometryis among its finest glories. Everythingin the window is generated from the properties of the square within the circle' (PaintonCowen) I 19 Tetrad from Isidore of Seville, op cit /~ / ^iC^tf^^^ / _^X\\ \ 2atooA Terdfo N N V' cs,D opitibsru 20 Tetrad from Bartholomaeus Anglicus, De proprietatibus rerum (Lyons, 1485) 40 EARLY MUSIC JANUARY 1981 elemental mean terms are represented as eight in number. This arrangement of elements and qualities the effect of dividing the circle into twelve which is of course the number of months in a year. The whole diagram thus symbolizes the world, the year and, finally, man himself. in illus. 19-that man's life The idea-implicit the year typical activity. The perfect integration of microand macrocosm is suggested by the arabesque illus. 19) which interweaves and binds together the concentric circles which symbolize these related planes of existence. In many late renaissance lutes and archlutes the strapwork which the instrument inherited from its Islamic origins has disappeared, and the rose consists entirely of floral arabesques. This type of non-geometric rose is in many cases purely decoraprobably has no symbolic meaning. But t widespread was the geometric design which combined the hexagram with the tetrad that it seems probable that the luthier wished to express in abstract form the kind of symbolic meaning which is familiar enough to students of renaissance literature. Just as, for example, the elaborate grouping and regrouping of characters in the fourth book of Spenser's Faerie Queene forms a tetradic pattern which mirrors the discordia concorsof the universe,26 so the

him in his attempts to regain his former grace and harmony. As Castiglione's Count Lodovico explains, it hath beene the opinion of most wise Philosophers, that the worlde is made of musike, and the heavens in their moving make a melodie, and our soule is framed after the verie same sort and therefore lifteth up it selfe, and (as it were) reviveth the vertues and force of it selfe with Musicke.29 It seems, therefore, entirely fitting that the noblest of instruments should express in visual form the ideal to which its music aspired. 21 The renaissancelute rose as a symbol of cosmic harmony renaissance lute rose may be 'read', point by point, as a symbol of cosmic harmony. Illus. 21 shows a typical late renaissance rose interpreted in such a manner. At the four points of the compass are the four elements, the four seasons and the four bodily humours and between them are their four pairs of mean terms. Binding together these corresponding planes of being and interlacing them is a graceful arabesque. Where the strapwork approaches the perimeter of the rose it divides the perfection of the circle into twelve equal sections, one for each sign of the zodiac, thus symbolizing in the same figure both the eternal revolution of the heavens and also the annual unit of time. The uniquely harmonious nature of the tetrad is finally recapitulated in the figure of the hexagram. As man was believed to be 'a little world made cunningly'27 whose own composition reflected that of the universe, so the hexagram occurs twice: once as a figure filling the entire rose, and again in microcosm at its centre. Together the tetrad and the hexad embrace the entire cosmos; for their sum is the decad, the most important of all numbers, and, in the words of lamblichus, the very 'root and fountain of overflowing Nature'.28 The Renaissance believed that music had an ennobling effect on the mind. If man was an imperfect creature inhabiting a fallen world, music could assist TheWHensintheirperelesprydemayboftj, Thattheyin theirorbiculer figure Arefarrcthefreil,andbychangevntoft, 4ltIans furet Keepingbyturne,their till Though rcuoluing yetalikeendure. As Or':;andCir^ figuresperfctteftt toexceiltherift. Heldbyalle^rt 22 John Norden explains the origin of the circle as a symbol of Rerum:An ElegiacallPoeme,of the interperfection. From Vicissitudo coursesandvarietieof thingsin thisworld(London, 1600) changeable Robin Headlam Wells studied at the universities of Leeds and Oxford, and at the Royal Academyof Music. At present he lectures in the English Department at Hull University wherehe is able to combinehis interestsin Elizabethanpoetry and music. He is currently writing a book on Edmund Spenser. ' Friedemann Hellwig, 'Lute Construction in the Renaissanceand Baroque', GSJ27 (1974), pp. 21-30. 2 ibid, p. 25. 'During the Renaissance the lute unquestionably occupied a special place of honour, second only to the human voice. It was the courtly instrument par excellence. . . Philosophers discussed it, theorists endowed it with the power of Apollo's lyre, poets praised it, and painters never ceased their delight in depicting it in a wide variety of roles. .... In literature the lute became the legendary instrument of Orpheus, with which he charmed all Nature and attempted to lead Eurydiceout of Hell: its noble classical associations are often invoked at moments of high tragedy'-David Munrow, Instrumentsof the Middle Ages and Renaissance(London, 1976), p. 75. 4 ThePoeticalWorks WilliamDrummond Hawthornden, ed. L. E. of of Kastner,2 vols (Edinburghand London, 1913) 2, p. 165. ' Sir Philip Sidney, TheDefenceof Poesie,The Complete Works of Sir Philip Sidney, ed. Albert Feuillerat,4 vols (Cambridge, 1923)3, p. 11. 6 George Puttenham, 'Of Ornament', TheArts EnglishPoesie,ed. of Gladys Doidge Willcock and Alice Walker (1936 R Cambridge, 1970), p. 137. See also Brian Vickers, ClassicalRhetoricin English Poetry (London, 1970), pp. 83-121. For a bibliography of

secondary material on rhetorical theory in the Renaissance see Vickers,ibid. 7 I should like gratefully to acknowledge the help of Diana Poulton and Friedemann Hellwig in supplying me with photographs, and Phil' Lourie and Tony Rooley for their valuable suggestions. 8 See Donald Gill, Wire-Strung PluckedInstruments with Contemporary the Lute, Lute Society Booklets, 3 (London, 1977), p. 18. The symbolism of the gothic rose is another subject and falls outside the scope of the present article. 9 See Keith Critchlow, IslamicPatterns:An Analyticaland Cosmological Approach (New Yorkand London, 1976). 10 See ErnstJ. Grube, TheWorldof Islam(London, 1966), p. 11. See also Oleg Grabar, The Formationof IslamicArt (New Haven and London, 1973),pp. 92-3. " See F. M. Cornford, 'Mysticismand Science in the Pythagorean Tradition', ClassicalQuarterly,16 (1922), pp. 137-50; 17 (1923), pp. 1-12; Leo Spitzer, 'Classical and Christian Ideas of World Harmony; Prolegomenon to an Interpretation of the Word "Stimmung" ', Traditio,2 (1944), pp. 409-69; 3 (1945), pp. 307-64; Gretchen Ludke Finney, MusicalBackgrounds for EnglishLiterature: 1580-1650 (New Brunswick, n.d.), pp. 1-20; John Hollander, The Untuningof the Sky: Ideas of Music in English Poetry 1500-1700 (Princeton, 1961), pp. 30-31; S. K. Heninger, Touchesof Sweet and Renaissance Poetics(San Marino, Harmony:Pythagorean Cosmology 1974), pp. 178-87. 12 'omnia, quae ex contrariis consisterunt, armonia quadam coniungi atque componi. Est enim armonia plurimorum adunatio et dissidentium consensio?' (Boethius, De InstitutioneArithmetica, 2, 32). 13 See Cornford, CQ 17, pp. Iff; Heninger, op cit, pp. 7 Iff; (London, 1970), pp. Iff. ChristopherButler, NumberSymbolism 14 See Heninger, op cit, p. 45. 15 See Russell A. Peck, 'Number as Cosmic Language', By Things Seen: Referenceand Recognitionin Medieval Thought,ed. David L. Jeffrey (Ottawa, 1979),p. 55. 16 See, for example, St Bonaventure: 'Number ... leads most directly to God. ... It causes him to be known in all corporeal and sensible things while we apprehend the rhythmical, delight in rhythmical proportions, and through laws of rhythmical proportions judge irrefragably'-Itinerarum Mentis ad Deum, 2, trans. George Boas (Indianapolis, 1953),p. 70. 17 William Ingpen, The Secretsof NumbersAccordingto Theologicail, Arithmeticall, Geometricall and Harmonicall Computation (London, 1624), p. 9. 18 See Alastair Fowler, Spenser and the Numbers of Time (London, 1964). 19 See Vincent Foster Hopper, Medieval Number Symbolism: Its Sources, Meaning and Influence on Thought and Expression (New York, 1938), pp. 136-20 1. 20 Macrobius, Commentary on the Dream of Scipio, trans. William Harris Stahl (New York, 1952), p. 102. 21 Ingpen, op cit, p. 44. 22 See, for example, Martianus Capella, De nuptiis Philologiaeet Mercurii:'totius harmoniae toni sunt sex...' (quoted Fowler, op cit, p. 49n). 23 Pierre de la Primaudaye, The FrenchAcademie, trans. T. Bowes (London, 1586),p. 177. 24 Macrobius, op cit, p. 105. 25 Painton Cowen, RoseWindows(London, 1979), p. 85. 26 See Fowler, op cit, pp. 27-9. 27 John Donne, HolySonnets,5. 28 lamblichus, De Vita Pythagorica Liber,quoted by Cornford, CQ 16, p. 1. 29 Baldassare Castiglione, TheBookof theCourtier,trans. Sir Thomas Hoby (London, 1928 R 1966), p. 75. 42 EARLY MUSIC JANUARY 1981 Stanesby Jr. Bassoon Baroque by Philip Levin Modelled after the 4 keyed original instrument, dated 1740, by Thomas Stanesby, Jr. of London. * A=415 * Keys for F, G#, D and Bb * Brass ferrules and keywork * Curly or straight Northeastern maple * Nitric acid color * Historical construction throughout Thisinstrument can be heardon a recordingof Handel'sOpus 3, ChamberPlayerson playedbythemaker,withtheSmithsonian the Smithsonian Recordslabel. Philip Levin/RO. Box 1090,112 FirstAvenue, N.Y.C., N.Y.10009 (212)674-6715 Levin Historical Instruments, Inc. VIOLA DA GAMBA SOCIETY announcespublication of its THEMATIC INDEX of MUSIC FOR VIOLS (First Instalment) Composers include Coleman, Cranford, Deering, the Ferraboscos, Finger, Gibbons, Hingeston, Holborne, Ives, Jenkins, Lawes, Lupo, Mico, Peerson, C. Simpson, Tomkins, Ward, White and Young. Format: A4 size, 212 pages, loose-leaf, unbound but drilled for 2-ring and 3-ring binders. Price: ?20 (?12 to members of the VdGS (Gt B), Lute Society, and VdGSA), post and packing extra. Orders,and enquiriesabout membership,to The Administrator Viola da Gamba Society 93A Sutton Road London N10 IHH England (Tel. 01-883 4677)