When was the beginning of polyphony?

Question

I've read a lot about Greek and ancient music. The history books say this music was only monophonic and we know only from iconical research (studying pictures from ancient times) of the practice of the ancient period.

My assumption is that the music was rarely notated and if it was, then only monophonically, but when it was played it must have been polyphonic.

Is there any evidence in historical literature or are there other theories of other researchers that support my hypothesis?

Edit:

I assume that there were more different instruments playing at once and not unisono. e.g. Nebukadnezar or the battle of Jericho. Maybe I have to overthink my understanding of polyphony. I thought monophonic implies all instrument or voicing are playing the same tune ... what in my imagination was almost impossible. I would imagine that one or more singer have been accompanied by a harp or a lyra in chords (eventually fourths and not triads and also there could have been happenings with improvisation in a poly rhythmic and hetero-phonic art and kind.

Answer 1

The oldest treatise describing polyphonic music in the European tradition is Musica Enchiriadis from the ninth century. It describes the practice of singing organum in a way that is surprisingly easy to grasp for us, modern musicians:

How ancient the practice was at that point is difficult to say. Iconography in itself cannot establish whether a certain musical practice is polyphonic or not: in two photos of an (Arab) Andalusian orchestra and a gamelan ensemble respectively one sees many musicians playing together. Only one of them shows music being played that we would call "polyphonic"

Answer 2

I've found today this youtube video:

May be this would give an answer. Maybe this all is only speculation.

The history books say this music was only monophonic

Edit:

What I’ve meant in my question obviously is called heterophony (I have to admit I’ve never heard this term before. But this is a good concept to differentiate between the music of ancient cultures and what is called polyphony in music in the ars nova aera.

heterophony: two or more instruments or singers playing/singing the same melody, but with each performer slightly varying the rhythm or speed of the melody or adding different ornaments to the melody. Two bluegrass fiddlers playing the same traditional fiddle tune together will typically each vary the melody a bit and each add different ornaments.: two or more instruments or singers playing/singing the same melody, but with each performer slightly varying the rhythm or speed of the melody or adding different ornaments to the melody. Two bluegrass fiddlers playing the same traditional fiddle tune together will typically each vary the melody a bit and each add different ornaments

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music

So it seems to me that begin of polyphony might presuppose a system of notation for different voices and this is the period we’ve already known.

Homophony? Heterophony or Polyphony?

You’ll find more information in this link ... http://theconversation.com/ancient-greek-music-now-we-finally-know-what-it-sounded-like-99895

Answer 3

Well, it's controversial, but some scholars have claimed that the Hurrian notation from about 1400 BCE represents polyphony. See Anne Kilmer's article. While some scholars have agreed and viewed this as possibly the first notated polyphony (notably including Richard Taruskin in his Oxford History of Western Music), many other possible interpretations of the Hurrian notation exist. Martin West critiques many of these interpretations, including Kilmer's, but nobody really knows the proper way to decipher this notation (they're just speculating, often based on the assumption that polyphony simply didn't exist in ancient times, with no evidence, so the notation supposedly couldn't possibly mean that?), so it could very well be a polyphonic work.

Answer 4

Gerhard Nestler writes inhis HISTORY OF MUSIC (1962, 4. ed. 1990)

Two appearances determine the sound of the music of England, the third and the Durtonalität. Probably people in England used to sing more vocally before than elsewhere. The earliest news of polyphonic singing comes from a bishop Aldheim, who lived 640-709. Giraldus Cambrensis describes a popular polyphonic singing in northern England in his "Descriptio Cambriae" around 1200. The first written example is a two-part hymn to St. Magnus from the end of the 13th century. But the deciding factor is that the main interval of this English two-part singing is the third. We ask in astonishment how the third is? We know that in the scale formation according to the fifth-principle of Pythagoras the third had to be regarded as an imperfect consonance, since the Pythagorean third has a difference of 81/80 to the mathematically pure third.

(translated by Google)

It is to say that polyphonic is the translation of mehrstimmig. I don‘t know whether this also includes organum and fauxbourdon. But right now I have found another information - the reason for this 2. answer:

The earliest known practical example of polyphonic music - a piece of choral music written for more than one part - has been found in a British Library manuscript in London.

link

Dec. 2014

Varelli’s research suggests that the author of the newly-found piece – a short “antiphon” with a second voice providing a vocal accompaniment – was writing around the year 900.