- Aristoxenus
:"For the 1st century physician of Asia Minor, see
Aristoxenus (physician) ."Aristoxenus (Greek: Ἀριστόξενος) of Tarentum (4th century BC) was a Greekperipatetic philosopher, and writer on music and rhythm.He was taught first by his father Spintharus, a pupil of
Socrates and also a musician, [Barker, p. 119] and later by the Pythagoreans,Lamprus of Erythrae andXenophilus , from whom he learned the theory of music. Finally he studied underAristotle atAthens , and was deeply annoyed, it is said, whenTheophrastus was appointed head of the school on Aristotle's death.His writings, said to have numbered four hundred and fifty-three, were in the style of Aristotle, and dealt with
philosophy ,ethics and music. The empirical tendency of his thought is shown in his theory that the soul is related to the body as harmony to the parts of a musical instrument. We have no evidence as to the method by which he induced this theory (cf.Theodor Gomperz , "Greek Thinkers", Eng. trans. 1905, vol. iii. p. 43).In music he held that the notes of the scale are to be judged, not as the Pythagoreans held, by mathematical ratio, but by the ear. The only work of his that has come down to us is the three books of the "Elements of Harmony", an incomplete musical treatise. Grenfell and Hunt's "Oxyrhynchus Papyri" (vol. i., 1898) contains a five-column fragment of a treatise on metre; probably this treatise of Aristoxenus.
Vitruvius in "De architectura " [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/20239/20239-h/29239-h.htm#Page_139 Book V Chapter IV] paraphases the writings of Aristoxenus on music. Translated by Morris H. Morgan, Ph.D, LL.D. Late Professor of Classical Philology in Harvard University. The full text of this translation is available from the "Project Gutenberg " [ [http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/20239 "Ten Books on Architecture"] by Vitruvius]His "Elementa harmonica" contain an important passage concerning the interpretation of
Plato 's metaphysical doctrine: [Konrad Gaiser, [http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/brill/phr/1980/00000025/F0020001/art00002 "Plato's enigmatic lecture "On the Good"] , Phronesis 25 (1980), pp. 5-37.]References
*1911
Further reading
* cite encyclopedia
last = Winnington-Ingram
first = R.P.
title = Aristoxenus
encyclopedia =Dictionary of Scientific Biography
volume = 1
pages = 281-283
publisher = Charles Scribner's Sons
location = New York
date = 1970
isbn = 0684101149
* Andrew Barker, "Aristoxenus" in "Greek Musical Writings, vol. 2: Harmonic and Acoustic Theory" (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 119-189.
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