Egyptologists examining the wealth of ancient hieroglyphs bequeathed to us discovered ancient Egyptians developed a diverse range of musical instruments. Egyptian musicians could draw upon stringed instruments together with wind and percussion instruments. Most musical performances were also accompanied by hand clapping to keep rhythm while both men and women sang to accompany the music.
Ancient Egyptians had no concept of musical notation. The tunes were passed down orally from one generation of musicians to another. Precisely how Egyptian musical compositions actually sounded is unknown today.
Scholars point to the modern-day Coptic liturgy a potentially being a direct descendant of Egyptian musical forms. Coptic emerged as the dominant language of ancient Egypt during the 4th century CE, and the music the Copts co-opted for their religious services is believed to have evolved from earlier forms of Egyptian services in a similar way to how as their language gradually evolved from its ancient Egyptian and Greek base.
Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics depict music as ‘hst’ this translates as “song”, “singer”, “conductor”, “musician”, and even as “to play music.” The precise meaning of the hieroglyph would be communicated by where it appeared in a sentence.
The ‘hst’ hieroglyph features a raised arm, symbolizing the role of a conductor in keeping time during a performance. Conductors, even of quite small troupes, appear to have enjoyed substantial social importance.
Tomb paintings found at Saqqara show a conductor with one hand over an ear to help his hearing and focus his concentration as he faces his assembled musicians and signals the composition to be played. Conductors in ancient Egypt are believed by scholars to have used hand gestures to communicate with their musicians based on modern interpretations of tomb paintings.
Performances were staged at banquets, in the temple complexes, at festivals, and during funerals. However, musical performances could be staged virtually anywhere. Members of high social rank regularly employed groups of musicians to entertain their guests during their evening meals and during social gatherings.
Many of the instruments discovered to date have been inscribed with the names of their gods indicating just how much the ancient Egyptians valued both their music and musical performances.
Egyptian Musical Instruments
The musical instruments developed and played in ancient Egypt would be familiar to us today.
Their musicians could call on percussion instruments such as drums, tambourines, rattles, and the sistrum, a metal instrument shaped like a ‘U’ with small metal or bronze pieces hanging from it on leather straps, held in the hand. When shaken it produced a range of sounds, depending on which type of metal had been used.
The sistrum was linked closely with the goddess Hathor, consort to Ra and goddess of women, of fertility, and love, and of the sky. Sistra featured in performances by temple musicians and dancers during ceremonies for many gods in the Egyptian pantheon. Some sistra gave off a soft jingling sound, while others made a loud clanking noise. Bells and cymbals were adopted at a later time.
One distinctly ancient Egyptian instrument was the menit-necklace. This was a heavily beaded neckpiece which could either be shaken by a performer while dancing or removed or and rattled by hand, particularly, during temple performances.
Wind instruments appear quite similar to the instruments we play today. They included trumpets together with shepherd’s pipes, clarinets, oboes, flutes, both employing single and double reeds and some forms of flutes without reeds.
The Egyptians repertoire of stringed instruments encompassed a broad range of lyres, harps, and the Mesopotamian lute. Unlike today’s string instruments, the stringed instruments of the ancient Egyptians were ‘plucked’, as the modern bow was unknown. Images abound of ancient Egyptians playing lutes, harps, and lyres.
