Renaissance Society of America

Review: [untitled]
Author(s): Beth Bullard
Source: Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 56, No. 4 (Winter, 2003), pp. 1236-1237
Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of the Renaissance Society of
America
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1262031
Accessed: 19/08/2010 23:45

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1236 RENAISSANCE QUARTERLY

modernEuropeanculture.This is a trulynew look at emblemsand emblembooks

by a knowledgeableand eloquentspecialistin the field.
DANIEL RUSSELL
Universityof Pittsburgh

Douglas Alton Smith. A Historyof the Lutefrom Antiquity to the Renaissance.

Ft. Worth:The LuteSocietyof America,2002. xvii + 389 pp. + 4 col. and 75 b/w pls. index.
append.illus. $85. ISBN: 0-9714071-0-X.
This book representsa massivescholarlyundertaking.DouglasAlton Smith,in
the preface,explainshis purposeand approach:hoping to providea missing"pan-
oramicview,"he chose "[1] to show in wordsand pictureshow and why the lute
changedphysicallythroughthe ages;[2] to give a generalintroductionto the lute's
use in society; [3] to tracethe developmentof its culturalsymbolism;[4] to place
the major lutenists and composersin perspectivebiographicallyand musically;
[5] to describesuccinctlythe musicalstyleof eachsignificantfigure;and [6] to sug-
gest how the musicof one mayhaveinfluencedothers"(xii-xiii).
Smithsucceedsadmirablyin his firstintention.His selectionand presentation
of picturesproveespeciallyeffectivein chapter4, arguablySmith'sbest:"Lutesand
LuteMakingin the MiddleAges and the Renaissance"(58-94, plus four pagesof
colorplates).Smith'ssecondpurposeis alsowell served,as he exploressocietaluses
of the lute. His thirdaim, tracingthe instrument'ssymbolism,appearsas a constant
throughoutthe book, supportingthe author'scentralthesis that "thelute was the
musicalemblemof humanism.... As long ashumanismheldsway,the lutewasthe
prince of instruments;when it waned, the days of the lute were numbered"(7).
Smith'sfourth,fifth, and sixth aimstakeup the bulk of the book. Forthesetopics,
the authoracknowledgesthe shortcomingof his relianceon secondarysourcesand
its resultingimbalances,since some areashave receivedmorescrutinythan others.
Thus, his treatmentis fulleston Italyand England;somewhatless on France,the
Lowlands,andSpain;andweakeston GermanyandEasternEurope.He wouldhave
been aidedhad he consultedmy studyand translationof SebastianVirdung'strea-
tise,Musicagetutscht,publishedin Baselin 1511 (Cambridge,1993). Smithis at his
most eloquentwhen commentingon composersandtheirmusicof whichhe appar-
entlyhas first-handknowledge.
Dr. Smith begins his panoramic view in Greece, where, ironically, no lute
existed.SmithconsidersancientGreeklyresand kitharas,becausehumanistsduring
the EuropeanRenaissancemisidentifiedthe lute with these instruments,transfer-
ringthe mythicandhistoricaltalesaboutthem to Renaissancethoughtandpractice.
Smithmovesto the lute'strueantecedentsin centralAsia,notablyPersia,then to its
adoptionby Arabs,amongwhom the lute held preeminencebeginningshortlyafter
the birth of Islam in 622. The lute traveled to Spain with Islam in about the ninth
century. Noting that Arabic translations of Greek classic writings rendered the
words "lyre"and "kithara"as "lute" (8), but not acknowledging the debt of the West
to Arabic scholarship, Smith fails to recognize how Arabic scholarship contributed
 REVIEWS 1237

to conflating the lute with the ancient Greekinstruments.He also ignores late-
antiqueand medievalbiblicaltraditions,such as translationsof the Hebrew"kin-
nor"(lyre)as "cithara," which came to be glossedpictoriallyin a numberof ways,
includingas lute or otherstringinstrument.During the twelfthto fifteenthcentu-
ries, the lute traveled- mainlyvia Sicily,accordingto Smith- to other partsof
Europe,where the instrumentand its music had their greatfloweringin the six-
teenth century.The exceptionwas Spain,wherethe guitar-shapedvihuelade [sic]
manosuddenlytook its place.Smith'sexplanationis plausible:by the 1490s the lute,
deemedtoo Moorishfor ChristianSpain,was expelledalong with its Muslimand
Jewishplayers,leavingits Christianpractitionersto adoptan acceptablealternative
(the vihuelawas strung,tuned, and playedlike the lute).
This book has much to recommendit. Laudable,for example,is Dr. Smith's
inclusion of some women's history: in ancient Greece (6), in "the Islamic era"
(8-10), in medievalSpain(16-18), and in the ItalianRenaissance(102-06). How-
ever,the book could have benefitedfrom a heaviereditorialhand. The minimal
punctuationmakesmany passagesdifficult to fathom. More annoying is lack of
coordinationbetweenillustrationsand accompanyingtexts- especiallytrueof the
musicalexamples.Smith'stranslationpolicy, furthermore,is inconsistent;some-
timeshe givesthe originallanguage,while at othertimeshe does not. Dr. Smithalso
frequentlyleavesa termor a personundefinedat firstmention,as if the bookis writ-
ten for those alreadyknowledgeable about the subject. Smith often jumps to
conclusionshe has not given the readercauseto accept, using verb formssuch as
"musthavebeen"and "surelyis,"forexample,whichwouldbe moreaccurateif soft-
ened to "mighthavebeen"and "wouldseem to be."Also troublingto the historian
in me areinstancesof anachronisticevidence,for example,the diagramof German
lute tablature(51, fig. 16) reproducedto illustratethe systeminventedin the mid-
fifteenthcentury:this diagramwas publishedin 1727 and basedon one printedin
1536. Troublingto the anthropologistin me is Smith'soverridingconcentrationon
historicaldevelopmenttowarda laterperiod, thus obscuringthe "thing"itself (a
piece of music, a style, a treatise, etc.) in favor of its place in a chronological
sequence.What "lutemusic"actuallywas at a given time is likewiseobscured.For,
if one relies primarily on what survives in notation, the repertoire appears to consist
only of what exists on paper. But music for lute was far more than that tiny tip of an
enormous iceberg, the rest being built on what we cannot so readily see - oral tra-
dition and improvisation. Indeed, much of the printed music for lute expressly
pointed away from itself, being put forth as models for study and imitation. Our
conclusions need to reflect how much of the repertory for lute at the time encom-
passed by this book was not static but ever moving - and not necessarily in the
direction or according to the categories we may superimpose on it today.
The panoramic view provided by Douglas Alton Smith is nevertheless of great
value, and it stands to spur another of Smith's hopes: to generate further studies that
will clarify our picture.
BETH BULLARD
George Mason University