Chapter IX: Front Matter (9)

Of the ancient buildings Nôtre-Dame de Fourvière is the most celebrated. The name originally applied to a small chapel built in the 9th century on the site of the old forum (_forum vetus_) from which it takes its name. It has been often rebuilt, the chief feature being a modern Romanesque tower surmounted by a cupola and statue of the Virgin. In 1872 a basilica was begun at its side in token of the gratitude of the city for having escaped occupation by the German troops. The building, finished in 1894, consists of a nave without aisles flanked at each exterior corner by a turret and terminating in an apse. The façade, the lower half of which is a lofty portico supported on four granite columns, is richly decorated on its upper half with statuary and sculpture. Marble and mosaic have been lavishly used in the ornamentation of the interior and of the crypt. Round the apse runs a gallery from which, according to an old custom, a benediction is pronounced upon the town annually on the 8th of September. From this gallery a magnificent view of the city and the surrounding country can be obtained. At the foot of the hill of Fourvière rises the cathedral of St Jean, one of the finest examples of early Gothic architecture in France. Begun in the 12th century, to the end of which the transept and choir belong, it was not finished till the 15th century, the gable and flanking towers of the west front being completed in 1480. A triple portal surmounted by a line of arcades and a rose window gives entrance to the church. Two additional towers, that to the north containing one of the largest bells in France, rise at the extremities of the transept. The nave and choir contain fine stained glass of the 13th and 14th centuries as well as good modern glass. The chapel of St Louis or of Bourbon, to the right of the nave, is a masterpiece of Flamboyant Gothic. To the right and left of the altar stand two crosses preserved since the council of 1274 as a symbol of the union then agreed upon between the Greek and Latin churches. Adjoining St Jean is the ancient Manecanterie or singers' house, much mutilated and frequently restored, but still preserving graceful Romanesque arcades along its front. St Martin d'Ainay, on the peninsula, is the oldest church in Lyons, dating from the beginning of the 6th century and subsequently attached to a Benedictine abbey. It was rebuilt in the 10th and 11th centuries and restored in modern times, and is composed of a nave with four aisles, a transept and choir terminating in three semicircular apses ornamented with paintings by Hippolyte Flandrin, a native of Lyons. The church is surmounted by two towers, one in the middle of the west front, the other at the crossing; the four columns supporting the latter are said to have come from an altar to Augustus. A mosaic of the 12th century, a high altar decorated with mosaic work and a beautifully carved confessional are among the works of art in the interior. St Nizier, in the heart of the city, was the first cathedral of Lyons; and the crypt in which St Pothinus officiated still exists. The present church is a Gothic edifice of the 15th century, with the exception of the porch, constructed by Philibert Delorme, a native of Lyons, in the 16th century. The Church of St Paul (12th and 15th centuries), situated on the right bank of the Saône, preserves an octagonal central tower and other portions of Romanesque architecture; that of St Bonaventure, originally a chapel of the Cordeliers, was rebuilt in the 15th and 19th centuries. With the exception of the imposing prefecture, the vast buildings of the faculties, which are in the Guillotière quarter, and the law court, the colonnade of which overlooks the Saône from its right bank, the chief civil buildings are in the vicinity of the Place des Terreaux. The east side of this square (so called from the _terreaux_ or earth with which the canal formerly connecting the Rhône and the Saône hereabouts was filled) is formed by the hotel de ville (17th century), the east façade of which, towards the Grand Theatre, is the more pleasing. The south side of the square is occupied by the Palais des Arts, built in the 17th century as a Benedictine convent and now accommodating the school of fine arts, the museums of painting and sculpture, archaeology and natural history, and the library of science, arts and industry. The museums are second in importance only to those of Paris. The collection of antiquities, rich in Gallo-Roman inscriptions, contains the bronze tablets discovered in 1528, on which is engraved a portion of a speech delivered in A.D. 48, by the emperor Claudius, advocating the admission of citizens of Gallia Comata to the Roman senate. The "Ascension," a masterpiece of Perugino, is the chief treasure of the art collection, in which are works by nearly all the great masters. A special gallery contains the works of artists of Lyons, among whom are numbered Antoine Berjon, Meissonier, Paul Chenavard, Puvis de Chavannes. In the Rue de la République, between the Place de la Bourse and the Place des Cordeliers, each of which contains one of its highly ornamented fronts, stands the Palais du Commerce et de la Bourse, the finest of the modern buildings of Lyons. The Bourse (exchange) has its offices on the ground floor round the central glass-roofed hall; the upper storeys accommodate the commercial tribunal, the council of trade arbitration, the chamber of commerce and the _Musée historique des Tissus_, in which the history of the weaving industry is illustrated by nearly 400,000 examples. In the buildings of the lycée on the right bank of the Rhône are the municipal library and a collection of globes, among them the great terrestrial globe made at Lyons in 1701, indicating the great African lakes.

The Hôtel Dieu, instituted according to tradition in the beginning of the 6th century by King Childebert, is still one of the chief charitable establishments in the city. The present building dates from the 18th century; its façade, fronting the west quay of the Rhône for over 1000 ft., was begun according to the designs of Soufflot, architect of the Pantheon at Paris. The Hospice de la Charité and the military hospital are on the same bank slightly farther down stream. The Hospice de l'Antiquaille, at Fourvière, occupies the site of the palace of the praetorian prefects, in which Germanicus, Claudius and Caracalla were born. Each of these hospitals contains more than 1000 beds. Lyons has many other benevolent institutions, and is also the centre of the operations of the Société de la Propagation de la Foi. The chief monuments are the equestrian statue of Louis XIV. in the Place Bellecour, the monuments of President Carnot, Marshal Suchet, the physicist André-Marie Ampère, and those in honour of the Republic and in memory of the citizens of the department who fell in the war of 1870-71. The most noteworthy fountain is that in the Place des Terreaux with the leaden group by Bartholdi representing the rivers on their way to the ocean.

There are Roman remains--baths, tombs and the relics of a theatre--in the St Just quarter on the right bank of the Saône. Three ancient aqueducts on the Fourvière level, from Montromant, Mont d'Or and Mont Pilat, can still be traced. Magnificent remains of the latter work may be seen at St Irénée and Chaponost. Traces also exist along the Rhône of a subterranean canal conveying the water of the river to a _naumachia_ (lake for mimic sea-fights). Agrippa made Lyons the starting-point of the principal Roman roads throughout Gaul; and it remains an important centre in the general system of communication owing to its position on the natural highway from north to south-eastern France. The Saône above the town and the Rhône below have large barge and steamboat traffic. The main line of the Paris-Lyon-Méditerranée railway runs first through the station at Vaise, on the right bank of the Saône, and thence to that of Perrache, the chief station in the city. The line next in importance, that to Geneva, has its station in the Brotteaux quarter, and the line of the eastern Lyonnais to St Genix d'Aoste has a terminus at Guillotière; both these lines link up with the Paris-Lyon main line. The railway to Montbrison starts from the terminus of St Paul in Fourvière and that to Bourg, Trevoux and the Dombes region from the station of Croix-Rousse. A less important line to Vaugneray and Mornant has a terminus at St Just. Besides the extensive system of street tramways, cable tramways (_ficelles_) run to the summits of the eminences cf Croix-Rousse, Fourvière and St Just.

Defence.

Lyons is, next to Paris, the principal fortress of the interior of
France, and, like the capital, possesses a military governor. The
immediate protection of the city is provided for on the east side by a
modern enceinte, of simple trace, in the plain (subsidiary to this is
a group of fairly modern detached forts forming an advanced position
at the village of Bron), and on the west by a line of detached forts,
not of recent design, along the high ground on the right bank of the
Saône. Some older forts and a portion of the old enceinte are still
kept up in the city itself, and two of these forts, Montessuy and
Caluire, situated on the peninsula, serve with their annexes to
connect the northern extremities of the two lines above mentioned. The
main line of defence is as usual the outer fort-ring, the perimeter of
which is more than 40 m., and the mean distance from the centre of the
city 6½ m. This naturally divides into four sections. In the eastern
plain, well in advance of the enceinte, eight principal sites have
been fortified, Feyzin, Corbas, St Priest, Genas, Azieu, Meyzieux,
Decines and Chaurant. These form a semicircle from the lower to the
upper reaches of the Rhône. The northern (or north eastern) section,
between the Rhône and the Saône, has forts Neyron and Vancia as its
principal defences; these and their subsidiary batteries derive some
additional support from the forts Montessuy and Caluire mentioned
above. On the north-west side there is a strong group of works
disposed like a redan, of which the salient, fort Verdun and annexes,
is on the high plateau of Mont d'Or pointing northward, and the faces,
represented by forts Freta and Paillet, are lower down on the spurs of
the ridge, facing north-east and north-west respectively. The
south-western section comprises three principal groups, Bruisson,
Côte-Lorette and Montcorin-Champvillard, the last-named crossing its
fire over the Lower Rhône with Fort Feyzin. Lastly a connecting
battery was built near Chapoly in 1895 to close the gap between the
north-western and south-western sections and to command the westward
approaches by the valley of Charbonnieres.

Lyons is the headquarters of the XIV. army-corps, the seat of an
archbishop who holds the title of primate of the Gauls and also that
of archbishop of Vienne, and of a prefect, a court of appeal, a court
of assizes, tribunals of commerce and of first instance, and of two
boards of trade arbitration (_conseils de prud'hommes_). It is the
centre of an _academie_ (educational division) and has a university
with faculties of law, letters, science and medicine and pharmacy.
There are also Catholic faculties (_facultés libres_) of law,
theology, science and letters, three _lycées_, training collèges for
teachers and numerous minor educational establishments. There are
besides many special schools at Lyons, the more important being the
school of fine arts which was founded in the 18th century to train
competent designers for the textile manufactures, but has also done
much for painting and sculpture; an army medical school, schools of
drawing, agriculture, music, commerce (_école supérieure de
commerce_), weaving, tanning, watch-making and applied chemistry, and
the écoles La Martiniere for free instruction in science and art as
applied to industry. The veterinary school, instituted in 1761, was
the first of its kind in Europe; its laboratory for the study of
comparative physiology is admirably equipped. Besides the _Académie
des Sciences, Belles Lettres et Arts_ (founded in 1700), Lyons
possesses societies of agriculture, natural history, geography,
horticulture, &c.

Industry and trade.

Its trade in silk and silk goods has formed the basis of the
prosperity of Lyons for several centuries. Derived from Italy, this
industry rapidly developed, thanks to the monopoly granted to the city
in 1450 by Charles VII. and to the patronage of Francis I., Henry II.
and Henry IV. From time to time new kinds of fabrics were
invented--silk stuffs woofed with wool or with gold and silver
threads, shawls, watered silks, poplins, velvets, satinades, moires,
&c. In the beginning of the 19th century J. M. Jacquard introduced his
famous loom by which a single workman was enabled to produce elaborate
fabrics as easily as the plainest web, and by changing the "cartoons"
to make the most different textures on the same looms. In the 17th
century the silk manufacture employed at Lyons, 9000 to 12,000 looms.
After the revocation of the edict of Nantes the number sank to 3000 or
4000; but after the Reign of Terror was past it rose again about 1801
to 12,000. Towards the middle of the 19th century the weaving branch
of the industry began to desert Lyons for the surrounding districts.
The city remains the business centre for the trade and carries on
dyeing, printing and other accessory processes. Lyons disputes with
Milan the position of the leading silk market of Europe. In 1905 the
special office (_la Condition des soies_) which determines the weight
of the silk examined over 4700 tons of silk. France furnished barely
one-tenth of this quantity, two-thirds came from China and Japan, the
rest from Italy and the Levant. The traders of Lyons re-export
seven-twelfths of these silks, the industries of the town employing
the remainder. An almost equal quantity of cotton, wool and waste-silk
threads is mixed with the silk. A few thousand hand-looms are still
worked in the town, more especially producing the richest materials,
50,000 or 55,000 in the surrounding districts, and some 33,000 machine
looms in the suburbs and neighbouring departments. Allied industries
such as dyeing, finishing and printing, employ 12,000 workers.
Altogether 300,000 workpeople depend upon the silk industry. In 1905
the total value of the manufacture was £15,710,000, the chief items
being pure silk textures (plain) £3,336,000; textures of silk mixed
with other materials £3,180,000; silk and foulards £1,152,000; muslins
£3,800,000, this product having increased from £100,000 in 1894.
Speaking roughly the raw material represents half the value, and the
value of the labour the remaining half. About 30% of the silk goods of
Lyons finds a market in France. Great Britain imported them to the
value of over £6,000,000, and the United States to the value of over
£1,600,000, notwithstanding the heavy duty. The dyeing industry and
the manufacture of chemicals have both developed considerably to meet
the requirements of the silk trade. Large quantities of mineral and
vegetable colouring matters are produced and there is besides a large
output of glue, gelatine, superphosphates and phosphorus, all made
from bones and hides, of picric, tartaric, sulphuric and hydrochloric
acids, sulphates of iron and copper, and pharmaceutical and other
chemical products.

Lyons does a large trade in metals, iron, steel and copper, and
utilizes them in the manufacture of iron buildings, framework,
bridges, machinery, railway material, scales, metal cables, pins and
needles, copper-founding and the making of clocks and bronzes. Gold
and silver-working is of importance, especially for embroidery and
articles used in religious ceremonies. Other industries are those of
printing, the manufacture of glass goods, of tobacco (by the state),
the preparation of hides and skins (occupying 20,000 workmen), those
connected with the miller's trade, the manufacture of various forms of
dried flour-paste (macaroni, vermicelli, &c.), brewing, hat-making,
the manufacture of chocolate, and the pork-butcher's industry. Apart
from the dealings in silk and silk goods, trade is in cloth, coal and
charcoal, metals and metal goods, wine and spirits, cheese and
chestnuts. Four miles south-west of Lyons is Oullins (pop. 9859) which
has the important works of the Paris-Lyon railway.

Lyons is the seat of important financial companies; of the Credit
Lyonnais, which does business to the amount of £200,000,000 annually
in Lyons alone; also of coal and metallurgical companies and gas
companies, the former extending their operations as far as Russia, the
latter lighting numerous towns in France and foreign countries.

_History._--The earliest Gallic occupants of the territory at the confluence of the Rhône and the Saône were the Segusians. In 59 B.C. some Greek refugees from the banks of the Hérault, having obtained permission of the natives to establish themselves beside the Croix-Rousse, called their new town by the Gallic name Lugudunum (q.v.) or Lugdunum; and in 43 B.C. Lucius Munatius Plancus brought a Roman colony to Fourvières from Vienne. This settlement soon acquired importance, and was made by Agrippa the starting-point of four great roads. Augustus, besides building aqueducts, temples and a theatre, gave it a senate and made it the seat of an annual assembly of deputies from the sixty cities of Gallia Comata. At the same time the place became the Gallic centre for the worship of Rome and the emperor. Under the emperors the colony of Forum Vetus and the municipium of Lugdunum were united, receiving the _jus senatus_. The town was burnt in A.D. 59 and afterwards rebuilt in a much finer style with money given by Nero; it was also adorned by Trajan, Adrian and Antoninus. The martyrdom of Pothinus and Blandina occurred under Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 177), and some years later a still more savage persecution of the Christians took place under Septimius Severus, in which Irenaeus, according to some authors, perished.

After having been ravaged by the barbarians and abandoned by the empire, Lyons in 478 became capital of the kingdom of the Burgundians. It afterwards fell into the hands of the Franks, and suffered severely from the Saracens, but revived under Charlemagne, and after the death of Charles the Bald became part of the kingdom of Provence. From 1032 it was a fief of the emperor of Germany. Subsequently the authority over the town was a subject of dispute between the archbishops of Lyons and the counts of Forez; but the supremacy of the French kings was established under Philip the Fair in 1312. The citizens were constituted into a commune ruled by freely elected consuls (1320). In the 13th century two ecclesiastical councils were held at Lyons--one in 1245, presided over by Innocent IV., at which the emperor Frederick II. was deposed; the second, the oecumenical, under the presidency of Gregory X., in 1274, at which five hundred bishops met. Pope Clement V. was crowned here in 1305, and his successor, John XXII., elected in 1316. The Protestants obtained possession of the place in 1562; their acts of violence were fiercely avenged in 1572 after the St Bartholomew massacre. Under Henry III. Lyons sided with the League; but it pronounced in favour of Henry IV. The executions of Henri d'Effiat, marquis of Cinq-Mars, and of François de Thou, who had plotted to overthrow Richelieu, took place on the Place des Terreaux in 1642. In 1793 the Royalists and Girondists, powerful in the city, rose against the Convention, but were compelled to yield to the army of the republic under General Kellermann after enduring a siege of seven weeks (October 10). Terrible chastisement ensued: the name of Lyons was changed to that of Ville-affranchie; the demolition of its buildings was set about on a wholesale scale; and vast numbers of the proscribed, whom the scaffold had spared, were butchered with grape shot. The town resumed its old name after the fall of Robespierre, and the terrorists in their turn were drowned in large numbers in the Rhône. Napoleon rebuilt the Place Bellecour, reopened the churches, and made the bridge of Tilsit over the Saône between Bellecour and the cathedral. In 1814 and 1815 Lyons was occupied by the Austrians. In 1831, 1834, 1849, 1870 and 1871 it was the scene of violent industrial or political disturbances. In 1840 and 1856 disastrous floods laid waste portions of the city. International exhibitions were held here in 1872 and 1894, the latter occasion being marked by the assassination of President Carnot.

See S. Charléty, _Histoire de Lyon_ (Lyon, 1903); J. Godart,
_L'Ouvrier en soie. Monographie du tisseur lyonnais_ (Lyon, 1899); A.
Vachet, _A travers les rues de Lyon_ (Lyon, 1902); A. Steyert,
_Nouvelle Histoire de Lyon et des provinces de Lyonnais Forez,
Beaujolais_ (3 vols., Lyon, 1895-1899).

LYONS, COUNCILS OF. The first Council of Lyons (the thirteenth general council) met at the summons of Pope Innocent IV. in June and July of 1245, to deliberate on the conflict between Church and emperor, on the assistance to be granted to the Holy Land and the Eastern empire, on measures of protection against the Tatars, and on the suppression of heresy. Among the tasks of the council mentioned in the writs of convocation, the most important, in the eyes of the pope, was that it should lend him effectual aid in his labours to overthrow the emperor Frederick II.; and, with this object in view, he had described the synod as a general council. Since its numbers were not far in excess of 150 bishops and archbishops, and the great majority of these came from France, Italy and Spain; while the schismatic Greeks and the other countries--especially Germany, whose interests were so deeply involved--were but weakly represented; the ambassador of Frederick, Thaddaeus of Suessa, contested its oecumenicity in the assembly itself. The condemnation of the emperor was a foregone conclusion. The articles of indictment described him as the "prince of tyranny, the destroyer of ecclesiastical dogma, the annihilator of the faith, the master of cruelty," and so forth; while the grossest calumnies were treated as approved facts. The objections of the ambassador, that the accused had not been regularly cited, that the pope was plaintiff and judge in one, and that therefore the whole process was anomalous, achieved as little success as his appeal to the future pontiff and to a truly oecumenical council. The representatives of the kings of England and France were equally unfortunate in their claim for a prorogation of the decision. On the 17th of July the verdict was pronounced by Innocent IV., excommunicating Frederick and dethroning him on the grounds of perjury, sacrilege, heresy and felony. All oaths of fealty sworn to him were pronounced null and void, and the German princes were commanded to proceed with the election of a new sovereign. In addition the council enacted decrees against the growing irregularities in the Church, and passed resolutions designed to support the Crusaders and revive the struggle for the Holy Land.

See Mansi, _Collectio conciliorum_, tom, xxiii.; Huillard-Breholles,
_Historia diplomatica Frederici II_., 6 tom. (Paris, 1852-1861);
Hefele, _Conciliengeschichte_, ed. 2, vol. v. (1886), pp. 1105-1126;
Fr. W. Schirrmacher, _Kaiser Friederich der Zweite_ (4 vols.,
Göttingen, 1859-1865); H. Schulz, in Herzog-Hauck, _Realencyklopädie_,
ed. 3, vol. ix. (1901), p. 122 sqq., s.v. "Innocenz IV."; A. Folz,
_Kaiser Friedrich II. u. Papst Innocenz IV_. (Strassburg, 1905).

The second Council of Lyons (the fourteenth general council) met from the 7th of May to the 17th of July 1274, under the presidency of Pope Gregory X., and was designed to resolve three problems: to terminate the Greek schism, to decree a new Crusade, and to counteract the moral corruption among clerics and laity. The council entered on its third task at a very late period, with the result that the requisite time for an adequate deliberation was not available. Nevertheless, on the 1st of November, Gregory was enabled to publish thirty-one constitutions, which may be taken to represent the fruits of the synod and its labours. The most important of the enactments passed is that regulating the papal election. It prescribed that the new election conducted by the college of cardinals should be held in conclave (q.v.), and its duration abridged by progressive simplification of the cardinal's diet. The motive for this decision, which has maintained its ground in ecclesiastical law, was given by the circumstances which followed the death of Clement IV. (1268). The pope felt a peculiar interest in the Holy Land, from which he was recalled by his elevation to the pontifical throne. He succeeded in bringing influential interests to work in the cause; but his scheme of a great enterprise backed by the whole force of the West came to nothing, for the day of the Crusades was past. His projected Crusade was interwoven with his endeavours to end the schism; and the political straits of the emperor Michael Palaeologus in Constantinople came to the aid of these aspirations. To ensure his safety against the attacks of King Charles of Sicily, who had pledged himself to assist the ex-emperor Baldwin in his reconquest of the Latin empire, Michael was required to own the supremacy of the pope in the spiritual domain; while Gregory, in return, would restrain the Sicilian monarch from his bellicose policy with regard to the Eastern empire. The ambassadors of the emperor appeared at the council with letters acknowledging the Roman pontiff and the confession of faith previously dispatched from the eternal city, and submitted similarly-worded declarations from the heads of the Byzantine Church. One member of the embassy, the Logothete Georgius Acropolites, was authorized by the emperor to take an oath in his name, renouncing the schism. In short, the subjection of the East to the Roman see was completed in the most binding forms, and the long-desired union seemed at last assured. Gregory himself did not live to discover its illusory character. The Council of Lyons was, moreover, of importance for the German dynastic struggle: for Gregory took the first public step in favour of Count Rudolph of Habsburg, the king-elect, by receiving his deputy and denying an audience to the delegate of the rival claimant, King Alphonso of Castile.

See Mansi, _Collectio conciliorum_, tom. xxiv.; Hefele,
_Conciliengeschichte_, vol. vi. ed. 2 (1890), p. 119 sqq. Also C.
Mirbt, in Herzog-Hauck, _Realencyklop. f. protestantische Theologie_,
vol. vii. (1899), p. 122, s.v. "Gregor X." (C. M.)

LYRA ("The Harp"), in astronomy, a constellation in the northern hemisphere, mentioned by Eudoxus (4th century B.C.) and Aratus (3rd century B.C.). Ptolemy catalogued 10 stars in this constellation; Tycho Brahe 11 and Hevelius 17. [alpha] _Lyrae_ or Vega, is the second brightest star in the northern hemisphere, and notable for the whiteness of its light, which is about 100 times that of the sun. The name "vega" is a remnant of an Arabic phrase meaning "falling eagle," "Altair," or [alpha] _Aquilae_, is the similar remnant of "flying eagle." [epsilon] _Lyrae_ is a multiple star, separated by the naked eye or by a small telescope into two stars; these are each resolved into two stars by a 3" telescope, while a more powerful instrument (4") reveals three smaller stars between the two pairs, [beta] _Lyrae_ and _R. Lyrae_ are short period variables. There is the famous ring or annular nebula, _M. 57 Lyrae_, in the middle of which is a very faint star, which is readily revealed by photography; and also the meteoric swarm named the _Lyrids_, which appear in April and have their radiant in this constellation (see METEOR).

LYRE (Gr. [Greek: lyra]), an ancient stringed musical instrument. The recitations of the Greeks were accompanied by it. Yet the lyre was not of Greek origin; no root in the language has been discovered for [Greek: lyra], although the special names bestowed upon varieties of the instrument are Hellenic. We have to seek in Asia the birthplace of the genus, and to infer its introduction into Greece through Thrace or Lydia. The historic heroes and improvers of the lyre were of the Aeolian or Ionian colonies, or the adjacent coast bordering on the Lydian empire, while the mythic masters, Orpheus, Musaeus and Thamyris, were Thracians. Notwithstanding the Hermes tradition of the invention of the lyre in Egypt, the Egyptians seem to have adopted it from Assyria or Babylonia.

To define the lyre, it is necessary clearly to separate it from the allied harp and guitar. In its primal form the lyre differs from the harp, of which the earliest, simplest notion is found in the bow and bowstring. While the guitar (and lute) can be traced back to the typical "nefer" of the fourth Egyptian dynasty, the fretted finger-board of which, permitting the production of different notes by the shortening of the string, is as different in conception from the lyre and harp as the flute with holes to shorten the column of air is from the syrinx or Pandean pipes. The frame of a lyre consists of a hollow body or sound-chest ([Greek: echeion]). From this sound-chest are raised two arms ([Greek: pecheis]), which are sometimes hollow, and are bent both outward and forward. They are connected near the top by a crossbar or yoke ([Greek: zygon, zygoma], or, from its having once been a reed, [Greek: kalamos]). Another crossbar ([Greek: malas, hypolyrion]), fixed on the sound-chest, forms the bridge which transmits the vibrations of the strings. The deepest note was the farthest from the player; but, as the strings did not differ much in length, more weight may have been gained for the deeper notes by thicker strings, as in the violin and similar modern instruments, or they were turned with slacker tension. The strings were of gut ([Greek: chorde], whence chord). They were stretched between the yoke and bridge, or to a tailpiece below the bridge. There were two ways of tuning: one was to fasten the strings to pegs which might be turned ([Greek: kollaboi, kollopes]); the other was to change the place of the string upon the crossbar; probably both expedients were simultaneously employed. It is doubtful whether [Greek: he chordotonos] meant the tuning key or the part of the instrument where the pegs were inserted. The extensions of the arms above the yoke were known as [Greek: kerata], horns.

The number of strings varied at different epochs, and possibly in different localities--four, seven and ten having been favourite numbers. They were used without a finger-board, no Greek description or representation having ever been met with that can be construed as referring to one. Nor was a bow possible, the flat sound-board being an insuperable impediment. The plectrum, however ([Greek: plektron]), was in constant use. It was held in the right hand to set the upper strings in vibration ([Greek: krekein, krouein to plektro]); at other times it hung from the lyre by a ribbon. The fingers of the left hand touched the lower strings ([Greek: psallein]).

FIG. 2.--Tortoise-shell Lyre from a Greek vase in Munich.]

With Greek authors the lyre has several distinct names; but we are unable to connect these with anything like certainty to the varieties of the instrument. Chelys ([Greek: chelys], "tortoise") may mean the smallest lyre, which, borne by one arm or supported by the knees, offered in the sound-chest a decided resemblance to that familiar animal. That there was a difference between lyre and cithara ([Greek: kithara]) is certain, Plato and other writers separating them. Hermes and Apollo had an altar at Olympia in common because the former had invented the lyre and the latter the cithara. The lyre and chelys on the one hand, and the cithara and phorminx on the other, were similar or nearly identical. Apollo is said to have carried a golden phorminx. (A. J. H.)

There are three lines of evidence that establish the difference between the lyre and cithara: (1) There are certain vase paintings in which the name [Greek: lyra] accompanies the drawing of the instrument, as, for instance, in fig. 2 where the tortoise-shell lyre is obviously represented.[1] (2) In all legends accounting for the invention of the lyre, the shell or body of the tortoise is invariably mentioned as forming the back of the instrument, whereas the tortoise has never been connected with the cithara. (3) The lyre is emphatically distinguished as the most suitable instrument for the musical training of young men and maidens and as the instrument of the amateur, whereas the cithara was the instrument of _citharoedus_ or _citharista_, professional performers at the Pythian Games, at ceremonies and festivals, the former using his instrument to accompany epic recitations and odes, the latter for purely instrumental music. The costume worn by citharoedus and citharista was exceedingly rich and quite distinct from any other.[2]

We find the lyre represented among scenes of domestic life, in lessons, receptions, at banquets and in mythological scenes; it is found in the hands of women no less than men, and the costume of the performer is invariably that of an ordinary citizen. Lyres were of many sizes and varied in outline according to period and nationality.

We therefore possess irrefutable evidence of identification in both cases, all of which tallies exactly. Examination of the construction of the instruments thus identified reveals the fact that both possessed characteristics which have persisted throughout the middle ages to the present day in various instruments evolved from these two archetypes. The principal feature of both lyre and cithara was the peculiar method of construction adopted in the sound-chest, which may be said to have been almost independent of the outline. In the lyre the sound-chest consisted of a vaulted back, in imitation of the tortoise, over which was directly glued a flat sound-board of wood or parchment. In the cithara (q.v.) the sound-chest was shallower, and the back and front were invariably connected by sides or ribs. These two methods of constructing the sound-chests of stringed instruments were typical, and to one or the other may be referred every stringed instrument with a neck which can be traced during the middle ages in miniatures, early printed books, on monuments and other works of art. (K. S.)

Passing by the story of the discovery of the lyre from a vibrating
tortoise-shell by Hermes, we will glance at the real lyres of Egypt
and Semitic Asia. The Egyptian lyre is unmistakably Semitic. The
oldest representation that has been discovered is in one of the tombs
of Beni Hassan, the date of the painting being in the XIIth Dynasty,
that is, shortly before the invasion of "the shepherd kings" (the
Hyksos). In this painting, which both Rosellini and Lepsius have
reproduced, an undoubted Semite carries a seven or eight-stringed
lyre, or rather cithara in transition, similar to the _rotta_ of the
middle ages. The instrument has a four-cornered body and an irregular
four-cornered frame above it, and the player carries it horizontally
from his breast, just as a modern Nubian would his kissar. He plays as
he walks, using both hands, a plectrum being in the right. Practical
knowledge of these ancient instruments may be gained through two
remarkable specimens preserved in the museums of Berlin (fig. 3) and
Leiden (see CITHARA). During the rule of the Hyksos the lyre became
naturalized in Egypt, and in the 18th dynasty it is frequently
depicted, and with finer grace of form. In the 19th and 20th dynasties
the lyre is sometimes still more slender, or is quite unsymmetrical
and very strong, the horns surmounted by heads of animals as in the
Berlin one, which has horses' heads at those extremities. Prokesch
copied one in the ruins of Wadi Halfa, splendid in blue and gold, with
a serpent wound round it. The Egyptians always strung their lyres
fan-shaped, like the modern Nubian kissar. Their paintings show three
to eight or nine strings, but the painters' accuracy may not be
unimpeachable; the Berlin instrument had fifteen. The three-stringed
lyre typified the three seasons of the Egyptian year--the water, the
green and the harvest; the seven, the planetary system from the moon
to Saturn. The Greeks had the same notion of the harmony of the
spheres.

There is no evidence as to what the stringing of the Greek lyre was in
the heroic age. Plutarch says that Olympus and Terpander used but
three strings to accompany their recitation. As the four strings led
to seven and eight by doubling the tetrachord, so the trichord is
connected with the hexachord or six-stringed lyre depicted on so many
archaic Greek vases. We cannot insist on the accuracy of this
representation, the vase painters being little mindful of the complete
expression of details; yet we may suppose their tendency would be
rather to imitate than to invent a number. It was their constant
practice to represent the strings as being damped by the fingers of
the left hand of the player, after having been struck by the plectrum
which he held in the right hand. Before the Greek civilization had
assumed its historic form, there was likely to be great freedom and
independence of different localities in the matter of lyre stringing,
which is corroborated by the antique use of the chromatic (half-tone)
and enharmonic (quarter-tone) tunings, pointing to an early
exuberance, and perhaps also to an Asiatic bias towards refinements of
intonation, from which came the [Greek: chroai], the hues of tuning,
old Greek modifications of tetrachords entirely disused in the classic
period. The common scale of Olympus remained, a double trichord which
had served as the scaffolding for the enharmonic varieties.

We may regard the Olympus scale, however, as consisting of two
tetrachords, eliding one interval in each, for the tetrachord, or
series of four notes, was very early adopted as the fundamental
principle of Greek music, and its origin in the lyre itself appears
sure. The basis of the tetrachord is the employment of the thumb and
first three fingers of the left hand to twang as many strings, the
little finger not being used on account of natural weakness. As a
succession of three whole tones would form the disagreeable and
untunable interval of a tritonus, two whole tones and a half-tone were
tuned, fixing the tetrachord in the consonant interval of the perfect
fourth. This succession of four notes being in the grasp of the hand
was called [Greek: syllabe], just as in language a group of letters
incapable of further reduction is called syllable. In the combination
of two syllables or tetrachords the modern diatonic scales resemble
the Greek so-called disjunct scale, but the Greeks knew nothing of our
categorical distinctions of major and minor. We might call the octave
Greek scale minor, according to our descending minor form, were not
the keynote in the middle the thumb note of the deeper tetrachord. The
upper tetrachord, whether starting from the keynote (conjunct) or from
the note above (disjunct), was of exactly the same form as the lower,
the position of the semitones being identical. The semitone was a
limma ([Greek: leimma]), rather less than the semitone of our modern
equal temperament, the Greeks tuning both the whole tones in the
tetrachord by the same ratio of 8:9, which made the major third a
dissonance, or rather would have done so had they combined them in
what we call harmony. In melodious sequence the Greek tetrachord is
decidedly more agreeable to the ear than the corresponding series of
our equal temperament. And although our scales are derived from
combined tetrachords, in any system of tuning that we employ, be it
just, mean-tone, or equal, they are less logical than the conjunct or
disjunct systems accepted by the Greeks. But modern harmony is not
compatible with them, and could not have arisen on the Greek melodic
lines.

The conjunct scale of seven notes

attributed to Terpander, was long the norm for stringing and tuning
the lyre. When the disjunct scale

the octave scale attributed to Pythagoras, was admitted, to preserve
the time-honoured seven strings one note had to be omitted; it was
therefore customary to omit the C, which in Greek practice was a
dissonance. The Greek names for the strings of seven and eight
stringed lyres, the first note being highest in pitch and nearest the
player, were as follows: _Nete_, _Paranete_, _Paramese_; _Mese_,
_Lichanos_, _Parhypate_, _Hypate_; or _Nete_, _Paranete_, _Trite_,
_Paramese_; _Mese_, _Lichanos_, _Parhypate_, _Hypate_--the last four
from Mese to Hypate being the finger tetrachord, the others touched
with the plectrum. The highest string in pitch was called the last,
[Greek: neate]; the lowest in pitch was called the highest, [Greek:
hypate], because it was, in theory at least, the longest string. The
keynote and thumb string was [Greek: mese], middle; the next lower was
[Greek: lichanos], the first finger or lick-finger string; [Greek:
trite], the third, being in the plectrum division, was also known as
[Greek: oxeia], sharp, perhaps from the dissonant quality to which we
have referred as the cause of its omission. The plectrum and finger
tetrachords together were [Greek: diapason], through all; in the
disjunct scale, an octave.

In transcribing the Greek notes into our notation, the absolute pitch
cannot be represented; the relative positions of the semitones are
alone determined. We have already quoted the scale of Pythagoras, the
Dorian or true Greek succession:--

Shifting the semitone one degree upwards in each tetrachord, we have
the Phrygian

Another degree gives the Lydian

which would be our major scale of E were not the keynote A. The names
imply an Asiatic origin. We need not here pursue further the
much-debated question of Greek scales and their derivation; it will
suffice to remark that the outside notes of the tetrachords were fixed
in their tuning as perfect fourths--the inner strings being, as
stated, in diatonic sequence, or when chromatic two half-tones were
tuned, when enharmonic two quarter-tones, leaving respectively the
wide intervals of a minor and major third, and both impure, to
complete the tetrachord. (A. J. H.)

See the article by Theodore Reinach in Daremberg and Saglio,
_Antiguites grecques et romaines_; Wilhelm Johnsen, _Die Lyra, ein
Beitrag zur griechischen Kunstgeschichte_ (Berlin, 1876); Hortense
Panum, "Harfe und Lyra in Nord Europa," _Intern. Mus. Ges._, Sbd. vii.
1, pp. 1-40 (Leipzig, 1905); A. J. Hipkins, "Dorian and Phrygian,
reconsidered from a non-harmonic point of view," in _Intern. Mus.
Ges._ (Leipzig, 1903), iv. 3.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See Ed. Gerhard, _Auserlesene griech. Vasenbilder_, part iii.
(Berlin, 1847), pl. 236 and p. 157.

[2] See Aristotle, _Polit_. v. 6. 5.

LYRE-BIRD, the name by which one of the most remarkable birds Of Australia is commonly known, the _Menura superba_ or _M. novae-hollandiae_ of ornithologists. It was first observed in 1798 in New South Wales, and though called by its finders a "pheasant"--from its long tail--the more learned of the colony seem to have regarded it as a bird-of-Paradise.[1] A specimen having reached England in 1799, it was described by General Davies as forming a new genus of birds, in the Linnean Society's _Transactions_ (vi. p. 207, pl. xxii.), no attempt, however, being made to fix its systematic place. In 1802 L. P. Vieillot figured and described it in a supplement to his _Oiseaux Dorés_ as a bird-of-Paradise (ii. pp. 30 seq., pls. 14-16), from drawings by Sydenham Edwards, sent him by Parkinson, the manager of the Leverian Museum. The first to describe any portion of its anatomy was T. C. Eyton, who in 1841 (_Ann. Nat. History_, vii. pp. 49-53) perceived that it was a Passerine bird and that it presented some points of affinity to the South American genus _Pteroptochus_. In 1867 Huxley stated that he was disposed to divide his very natural assemblage the _Coracomorphae_ (essentially identical with Eyton's _Insessores_) into two groups, "one containing _Menura_, and the other all the other genera which have yet been examined" (_Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1867, p. 472)--a still further step in advance.[2] In 1875 A. Newton put forth the opinion in his article on birds, in the 9th edition of this _Encyclopaedia_, that _Menura_ had an ally in another Australian form, _Atrichia_ (see SCRUB-BIRD), which he had found to present peculiarities hitherto unsuspected, and he regarded them as standing by themselves, though each constituting a distinct family. This opinion was partially adopted in the following year by A. H. Garrod, who (_Proc. Zool. Society_, 1876, p. 518) formally placed these two genera together in his group of Abnormal Acromyodian _Oscines_ under the name of _Menurinae_; ornithologists now generally recognize at once the alliance and distinctness of the families Menuridae and Atrichiidae, and place them together to form the group _Suboscines_ of the Diacromyodian _Passeres_.

Since the appearance in 1865 of J. Gould's _Handbook to the Birds of Australia_, little important information has been published concerning the habits of this form, and the account therein given must be drawn upon for what here follows. Of all birds, says that author, the _Menura_ is the most shy and hard to procure. He has been among the rocky and thick "brushes"--its usual haunts--hearing its loud and liquid call-notes for days together without getting sight of one. Those who wish to see it must advance only while it is singing or scratching up the earth and leaves; and to watch its actions they must keep perfectly still. The best way of procuring an example seems to be by hunting it with dogs, when it will spring upon a branch to the height of 10 ft. and afford an easy shot ere it has time to ascend farther or escape as it does by leaps. Natives are said to hunt it by fixing on their heads the erected tail of a cock-bird, which alone is allowed to be seen above the brushwood. The greater part of its time is said to be passed upon the ground, and seldom are more than a pair to be found in company. One of the habits of the cock is to form small round hillocks, which he constantly visits during the day, mounting upon them and displaying his tail by erecting it over his head, drooping his wings, scratching and pecking at the soil, and uttering various cries--some his own natural notes, others an imitation of those of other animals. The tail, his most characteristic feature, only attains perfection in the bird's third or fourth year, and then not until the month of June, remaining until October, when the feathers are shed to be renewed the following season. The food consists of insects, especially beetles and myriapods, as well as snails. The nest is placed near to or on the ground, at the base of a rock or foot of a tree, and is closely woven of fine but strong roots or other fibres, and lined with feathers, around all which is heaped a mass, in shape of an oven, of sticks, grass, moss and leaves, so as to project over and shelter the interior structure, while an opening in the side affords entrance and exit. Only one egg is laid, and this of rather large size in proportion to the bird, of a purplish-grey colour, suffused and blotched with dark purplish-brown.

Incubation is believed to begin in July or August, and the young is hatched about a month later. It is at first covered with dark down, and appears to remain for some weeks in the nest. It is greatly to be hoped that so remarkable a form as the lyre-bird, the nearly sole survivor apparently of a very ancient race of beings, will not be allowed to become extinct--its almost certain fate so far as can be judged--without many more observations of its manners being made. Several examples of _Menura_ have been brought alive to Europe, and some have long survived in captivity.

Three species of _Menura_ have been indicated--the old _M. superba_, the lyre-bird proper, which inhabits New South Wales, the southern part of Queensland, and perhaps some parts of Victoria; _M. victoriae_, separated from the former by Gould (_Proc. Zool. Soc._, 1862, p. 23), and said to take its place near Melbourne; and _M. alberti_, first described by C. L. Bonaparte (_Consp. Avium_, i. 215) on Gould's authority, and, though discovered on the Richmond river in New South Wales, having apparently a more northern range than the other two. All those have the apparent bulk of a hen pheasant, but are really much smaller, and their general plumage is of a sooty brown, relieved by rufous on the chin, throat, some of the wing-feathers and the tail-coverts. The wings, consisting of twenty-one remiges, are rather short and rounded; the legs[3] and feet very strong, with long, nearly straight claws. In the immature and female the tail is somewhat long, though affording no very remarkable character, except the possession of sixteen rectrices; but in the fully-plumaged male of _M. superba_ and _M. victoriae_ it is developed in the extraordinary fashion that gives the bird its common English name. The two exterior feathers (fig. 1, a, b) have the outer web very narrow, the inner very broad, and they curve at first outwards, then somewhat inwards, and near the tip outwards again, bending round forwards so as to present a lyre-like form. But this is not all; their broad inner web, which is of a lively chestnut colour, is apparently notched at regular intervals by spaces that, according to the angle at which they are viewed, seem either black or transparent; and this effect is, on examination, found to be due to the barbs at those spaces being destitute of barbules. The middle pair of feathers (fig. 2, a, b) is nearly as abnormal. These have no outer web, and the inner web very narrow; near their base they cross each other, and then diverge, bending round forwards near their tip. The remaining twelve feathers (fig. 3) except near the base are very thinly furnished with barbs, about ¼ in. apart, and those they possess, on their greater part, though long and flowing, bear no barbules, and hence have a hair-like appearance. The shafts of all are exceedingly strong. In the male of _M. alberti_ the tail is not only not lyriform, but the exterior rectrices are shorter than the rest. (A. N.)

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Collins, _Account of New South Wales_, ii. 87-92 (London, 1802).

[2] Owing to the imperfection of the specimen at his disposal,
Huxley's brief description of the bones of the head in _Menura_ is
not absolutely correct. A full description of them, with elaborate
figures, is given by Parker in the same Society's _Transactions_ (ix.
306-309, pl. lvi. figs. 1-5).

[3] The metatarsals are very remarkable in form, as already noticed
by Eyton (_loc. cit._), and their tendons strongly ossified.

LYRICAL POETRY, a general term for all poetry which is, or can be supposed to be, susceptible of being sung to the accompaniment of a musical instrument. In the earliest times it may be said that all poetry was of its essence lyrical. The primeval oracles were chanted in verse, and the Orphic and Bacchic Mysteries, which were celebrated at Eleusis and elsewhere, combined, it is certain, metre with music. Homer and Hesiod are each of them represented with a lyre, yet if any poetry can be described as non-lyrical, it is surely the archaic hexameter of the _Iliad_ and the _Erga_. These poems were styled epic, in direct contradistinction to the lyric of Pindar and Bacchylides. But inexactly, since it is plain that they were recited, with a plain accompaniment on a stringed instrument. However, the distinction between epical and lyrical, between [Greek: ta epe], what was said, and [Greek: ta mele], what was sung, is accepted, and neither Homer nor Hesiod is among the lyrists. This distinction, however, is often without a difference, as for example, in the case of the so-called _Hymns_ of Homer, epical in form but wholly lyrical in character. Hegel, who has gone minutely into this question in his _Esthetik_, contends that when poetry is objective it is epical, and when it is subjective it is lyrical. This is to ignore the metrical form of the poem, and to deal with its character only. It would constrain us to regard Wordsworth's _Excursion_ as a lyric, and Tennyson's _Revenge_ (where the subject is treated exactly as one of the Homeridae would have treated an Ionian myth) as an epic. This is impossible, and recalls us to the importance of taking the form into consideration. But, with this warning, the definition of Hegel is valuable. It is, as he insists, the personal thought, or passion, or inspiration, which gives its character to lyrical poetry.