© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi 10.1163/22129758-12341252
Greek and Roman Musical Studies � (�0 �4) 50-67
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Iconographical Representations of Musical
Instruments in Apulian Vase-Painting as Ethnical
Signs: Intercultural Greek-Indigenous Relations
in Magna Graecia (5th and 4th Centuries B.C.)
Fábio Vergara Cerqueira
Federal University of Pelotas—UFPel, Brazil
Rua General Telles, n. 861, apto. 1105. Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
CEP 96.010-310
fabiovergara@uol.com.br
Abstract
The paper deals with the representation of musical instruments on Apulian pottery.
I shall sketch a general account of the red-figured pottery produced in Apulia and its
development between the late fifth and the early third centuries, discussing the icono-
graphical trends in its different phases. Secondly, I shall offer a brief survey of the musi-
cal instruments: the instruments belonging to Greek tradition (lyra, kithara, aulos) as
well as those belonging to local tradition (rectangular cithara, rectangular sistrum),
and those that result from local developments of instruments received from the Greek
continental tradition (tympanon, pektis). Morphological and contextual analysis of the
representation of such instruments will allow us to sustain our inferences about the
intercultural processes of hybridization between local, Greek and oriental organologi-
cal traditions, pointing to a scenario of multiple and negotiated identities in the colo-
nial world of Magna Graecia.
Keywords
Magna Graecia – Apulia – music – iconography – pottery – identity