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The Old Babylonian tuning text UET VI/3 8991

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Sam Mirelman  and
Theo J. H. Krispijn
Sam Mirelman
Affiliation:
Department of Music, School of Oriental and African Studies, Thomhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG
Theo J. H. Krispijn
Affiliation:
Universiteit Leiden, TCMO — Assyriologie, POB 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, Netherlands
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Abstract

The text discussed here is one of only two identified fragments of Mesopotamian instructions for tuning a stringed instrument. Apart from its rarity, this text is important in several other respects. It confirms the reconstruction of the tuning cycle suggested by the other tuning fragment (UET VII 74), it appears to belong to a duplicate manuscript of the tuning cycle, it supports the argument for the presence of the verb nê'um (as opposed to enûm) in Akkadian terminology for tuning, and it offers a revised reading of the music-theoretical term nīš GABA.RI as nīš tuḫri(m).

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 71 , 2009 , pp. 43 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 2009

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Footnotes

1

This article was completed in July 2008. We would like to thank M. J. Geller and N. J. C. Kouwenberg for their helpful comments. We remain responsible for all errors.

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