EDITOR'S NOTE: As always, this series of articles is designed to educate the average Elanthian on the real world history and nature of each instrument detailed, and to place the instruments in a better context for those who play and use them in the Lands.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: The fine folks at Musiqua Antiqua provided an essential resource for the research involved in this article. Their website, along with the sounds of several medieval musical instruments, can be found by clicking on the link attached to their name.

Several written resources proved invaluable as well, including the following titles: Musicians in English Society from Elizabeth to Charles I by W. L. Woodfill, Old English Instruments of Music by F. W. Galpin, Music in Medieval Britain by F. L. Harrison, and Woodwind Instruments and their History by A. Baines.

The Shawm

Single-reed and double-reed instruments, which create music by a rush of air, from either the lungs of the musician or from a wind chest, causing either the single reed or the dual reeds to vibrate, have existed for a long time.

The people of Dynastic Egypt crafted the original double-reed instrument, a small pipe in which two barley straws flattened and placed at the mouthhole. These reed pipes possessed three or four vent holes, which increased the range of sounds or tones they could play. Such pipes were also crafted of different length, depending on the precise pitch desired by their artisan-creators.

The Romans created similar double-reed instruments. These were known as tibiae or "shinbones."

By the twelfth century, a short double-reed instrument possessing a conical bore with a wide bell had been developed. Brought to Europe from the Mideast during the Crusades, it was named the shawm, though it was sometimes called a shalmey or chalumeau.

Despite the fact that the instrument was well-known in the Mideast, the shawm didn't reach a higher level of popularity in Europe until the Renaissance, when it became a very popular instrument for use at festivals and for other entertainment. Shawm bands, both in palace courtyard and in market square, were common. The instrument appeared very much like a cross between today's bassoon, a clarinet, and a recorder.

The shawm’s tone could be described as 'loud' or 'shrill' and because of the piercing quality and sheer volume of its tone, the shawm was primarily played outdoors. The most common venue for playing shawms was a processional or parade, composed of several shawms and their players, sometimes on horseback, other times on foot, depending on the event.

Usually made in one piece, the shawm had a conical bore that flared more than that of its successor the oboe, and was fitted with a pirouette or staple, a funnel-shaped reed shield. The "shield" was made in a variety of shapes, against which player could press his lips while taking the projecting part of reed into his mouth. This helped musicians avoid lip-fatigue and protected the reed itself. When the musician placed his lips against the pirouette and blew, the reeds vibrated freely, producing the instrument’s tone.

This technique meant that the musician could play with the reserve air in his cheeks whilst breathing in through his nose -- a technique known as circular breathing. Many players would also bind their cheeks in an effort to control the disfigurement caused by the puffing of their cheeks and thereby gain some control over their breathing.

All shawms of any size had several vent holes between the hole for the lowest note and the end of the bell. The length of this section of the instrument, which was very long -- sometimes as much as three-quarters of the instrument's total length -- contributed to the shawm's tone, as well as its resonance. A large pierced wooden barrel known as a fontanelle guarded the keywork on the intrument's lowest end, the footjoint, where the lowest note or notes were located.

The notched metal band with rounded teeth often found wrapped around the bell-shaped mouth of the instrument protected both the shawm and its player from damage. The deceivingly fashionable adornment transformed the long woodwind into a metal-reinforced short quarterstaff, which was more than capable of settling violent arguments between street musicians.

Various names were given to the instrument in France, Germany and England. The larger, lower-pitched, members of the shawm family were called bombarde or pommer. In the fourteenth century the term hautbois, literally "high wood," appeared, though in the late seventeenth century, this term was eventually transferred to the oboe, a woodwind crafted specifically for playing indoors and the shawm's modern ancestor. The term schalmei was also common, though more so in the early Middle Ages; by the mid- to late 1500s, the instrument was more often referred to as a shawm.

Shawm-type instruments are known by various names outside Europe, such as sahnai in India and zurna in some Middle Eastern countries.

The shawm was made in seven sizes: high treble, treble, alto, tenor, basset, bass and great bass. Each size differed in pitch, with the smaller instruments displaying a range close to a single octave. The larger instruments generally had a broader range than their smaller brethren did, with the bass shawm stretching to cover over two octaves. The smallest shawms measured slightly under two feet long , while the largest examples, the great bass shawms, reached a stunning length over ten feet.

Dulcian
(sordune, bassanelli, or curtal)

One of the problems with medieval music was that an instrument was often limited in its tonal range to a single octave. To create instruments with a wider range, instrument craftsmen made families of instruments of varying sizes, each size encompassing a particular range of tones. The difficulty was that the larger instruments were, to be blunt, rather unwieldy, often resting on the ground or the street a considerable distance from the musician's feet.

In the sixteenth century, instrument makers discovered "the double-bore principle." Two holes drilled in the same piece of wood and precisely parallel to each other, connected to one another by a U-shaped curve, permitted a woodwind to sound twice as low as an identical instrument with a single hole or bore. Considering the massive size of the bass shawm (six feet or more), its evolution into a folded, double-bore instrument was inevitable once the double-bore was discovered.

The dulcian is the most direct ancestor of the modern bassoon, as well as a descendant of the medieval shawm. The obvious difference is that the dulcian had two bores connected at the bottom, so it was essentially a bass shawm folded in half, which made it considerably more convenient to play and carry.

Besides not being eight feet long and requiring a stepladder to play, the dulcian's curved bore provided a considerably quieter and more mellow tone, allowing it to be played not only with shawms, sackbutts and cornetti, but also strings and even recorders and early flutes.

The historical origins of this instrument have yet to be discovered, though some evidence points to Italy as the instrument's birthplace. The name dulcian (also dulzian, dulzian, dolzone, delzan, dulcan, dolcan) is from the Latin dulcis, meaning " sweet." This instrument was also called the curtal (or curtoll, curtail) from the Latin curtus or "short." The second moniker was mostly used by the British afficianados of the instrument.

By the end of the sixteenth century, the versatile dulcian had overtaken the cumbersome and heavy bass shawm. Unlike the bass shawm, the dulcian could be used not only as an outdoor band instrument, but could also be played indoors. A dulcian could be played in church to provide the bass tone for motets and masses; it could be played in rooms and chambers at court and other secular areas, providing intimate music for those subdued settings.

To counteract the bottom-heavy sound created by its conical bore, and to permit it to play with softer instruments without drowning them out, a perforated mute, or a bell cap resembling a pepper shaker, was often inserted in the open end of the dulcian.

The dulcian had only two keys, one of them being for the thumb. As technology progressed, keys began to appear on the instrument and the dulcian eventually evolved into what would become the modern bassoon.

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