Archaeomusicology: history of concussion idiophones back to menu

My secondary research activity in archaeomusicology focuses on the history of concussion idiophones from antiquity to the present day. Concussion idiophones consist of two or more complementary sonorous parts struck against each other (cymbals, castanets, etc…). I have recently published two articles on cymbal playing techniques in the Roman Empire. My methodology is essentially based on comparative iconography and experimental archaeology.

o I have recently put forward the fact that dancers from the Roman Empire could use two cymbals per hands, attached to two different fingers, in a way similar to modern Middle Eastern Dancers from Egypt and Turkey. For more details, see:

A. Cottet, Playing finger cymbals in the Roman Empire: an iconographic study,

Early Music, Volume 50, Issue 1, February 2022, Pages 3–20

https://doi.org/10.1093/em/caab073

o I have also published an analysis of the Roman-imperial mosaic of the female musicians from Mariamin in Syria. This mosaic depicts a type of cymbal tongs, the “lateral” cymbal tongs, which differs from the “frontal” cymbal tongs considered so far by scholars, regarding the placement of the cymbals. I have studied the acoustic properties of these two types of instruments by realizing functional reconstructions. For more details, see:

A. Cottet, Cymbals playing in a Roman mosaic from Mariamin in Syria, CLARA (Classical Art and Archeology), Volume 9

https://journals.uio.no/CLARA/article/view/9726

Studying Roman-period cymbals at the Musée d’Archéologie de Nice / Cimiez

Covers of the peer-reviewed journals Early Music and CLARA (Classical Art and Archaeology)

featuring illustrations of my two recent articles on cymbals playing in the Roman Empire