Glen Collection of printed music > Printed music > General collection of the ancient music of Ireland

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Wales before them, where it was in the fourteenth century
increased to a triple row of strings, and the number
raised to ninety-seven ; no alteration was even attempted
in theirs for an hundred years afterwards. Robert Nugent,
a Jesuit, who resided some time in this country, then im¬
proved it by enclosing an open space between the trunk
and upper arm, covering with a lattice work of wood the
sound holes on the right side, and placing a double row
of chords on each side*. This innovation on the sim¬
plicity of our music does not appear to have gained
ground, and has since been entirely abandoned.
It is asserted that the Irish had the double row of strings
from Wales; Davydd Bervwynn, one of their bards, hav¬
ing said, about 1589, that his Harp contained twenty-
nine strings or more ; but it has just been shewn that
Nugent introduced it in Ireland a century earlier. Even
the single rowed Irish Harp, so long in common use, con¬
tains a number of strings equal to those of Benwynn, and
thus renders the assertion nugatory in itself.
The most ancient Irish Harp probably now remaining
is that which is said to have belonged to Brian Boiromhe,
king of Ireland, who was slain in battle with the Danes
at Clontarf near Dublin, A. D. 1014. His son, Donogh,
having murdered his brother Teige in the year 1023, and
being deposed by his nephew, retired to Rome, and car¬
ried with him the crown, Harp, and other regalia of his
father, which he presented to the pope in order to obtain
absolution. Adrian the Fourth, surnamed Breakspear,
alleged this circumstance as one of the principal titles to
this kingdom in his bull, transferring it to Henry II.
These regalia were deposited in the Vatican till the pope
sent the Harp to Henry VIII. with the title of Defender
of the Faith, but kept the crown, which was of massive
gold. Henry gave the Harp to the first earl of Clan-
rickard, in whose family it remained till the beginning of
this century; when it came by a lady of the De Burgh
family into that of McMahon, of Clenagh, in the county
of Clare; after whose death it passed into the possession
of commissioner M
£
Namara, of Limerick. In 1182, it was
presented to the right hon. WilliamConyngham, who depo¬
sited it in Trinity College, Dublin, where it still remains.
This Harp had only one row of strings, is thirty-two
inches high, and of extraordinary good workmanship.
The sound board is of oak, the pillar and comb of red
sallow, the extremity of the uppermost bar, or comb, in
part is capped with silver, extremely well wrought and
chiselled. It contains a large chrystal set in silver, and
under it was another stone, now lost. The buttons or
ornamental knobs at the sides of the bar are of silver. On
the front of the pillar are the arms chased in silver of the
O'Brian's family, the bloody hand supported by lions; on
the side of the pillar within two circles are the Irish wolf
dogs carved in the woods. The string notes of the sound
board are neatly ornamented with escutcheons of brass
carved and gilt. The sounding holes have been orna¬
mented, probably of silver, as they have been the object
of theft. This Harp has twenty-eight string screws, and
the same number of string holes to answer them, con¬
sequently there were twenty-eight strings. The bottom
which it rests upon is a little broken, and the wood very
rotten; the whole bears evidence of an expert artist f.
In Vincentio Galilei’s Dissertation on ancient and
modern Music, printed at Florence in the year 1581, we
have the following interesting information J.
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Among the stringed instruments now in use in
Italy, the first is the Harp, which is only an ancient
cithara, so far altered in form by the artificers of those
days as to adapt it to the additional number, and the
tension of the strings, containing from the highest to
the lowest note, more than three octaves. This most
ancient instrument was brought to us from Ireland (as
Dante says§) where they are excellently made, and
in great numbers, the inhabitants of that island having
practised on it for many and many ages: nay, they even
place it in the arms of the kingdom, and paint it on
their public buildings, and stamp it on their coin, giving
as the reason their being descended from the royal
prophet David. The Harps which this people use are
* According to titular archdeacon Lynch, of Tuam, who wrote under the signature of Gratianus Lucius, p. 37.
f Collect de Rib, Hib. No. 13. Dr. Ledwich has denied that this Harp could have belonged to Brian Boiromhe on account of the arms :
armorial bearings, he asserts, were not introduced into this country earlier than the reign of Edward the Confessor.
On a strict examination of the Harp in question, we are inclined to doubt its being of such antiquity as the time of that Irish monarch j
we conceive it to be in too sound a state to have been made in that sera, especially considering the nature of the wood, viz. red sallow: even the sound
board is of this species, and not of oak, which, by general Vallancey’s description, it should be. The appearance of the latter timber is produced
merely by a slip of it clumsily nailed on the back of the sound board to keep it together, the bottom having been worm-eaten. A Harp made
by Cormack O’Kelly, of Ballynascreen, in the county of Londonderry, about the year 1700, bears so perfect a resemblance to the Dublin Harp in
every respect, among others, in the figures of the wolf dogs engraved on the front pillars of both, that it is not an unfair conjecture, that the age of
the supposed Harp of the Irish monarch has been greatly overrated: till we have authority to pro\
r
e the transmission of the instrument from the
pope to Henry VIII., and from the latter to the earl of Clanrickard, we must remain of the opinion we ha\’e expressed. If the fact of its having
existed 800 years rest solely on tradition, that evidence is too weak where internal proof is wanting.
jThis most curious document we have translated from Vincentio Galilei’s Dialogue on ancient and modern Music, folio edition, Florence,
A. D. 1581. Part of it may be seen in Jones’s W. Bards, under another form. The honour it does to the Irish Harp Yvill account for our giving a
new translation, and entering farther into the detail: after long search, it was found in the library of Jesus College, Oxford. In the British Museum
we had previously met with the edition of 1602: he was a noble Florentine, and father of the great Galileo (Galilei), and a proficient in music,
being an excellent performer on the lute. Assisted by signior Giovanni, Dr. Burney says, he was the first who composed melodies for a single voice,
having modulated the pathetic scene of count Ugolino, written by Dante, which he sung himself sweetly to the accompaniment of a viol: he set,
in the same style, parts of the Lamentations of Jeremiah. [H. of Music, iv. p. 22.]
§ Dante lived about A. D. 1300.