Athenaeus, The Deipnosophists
C. D. Yonge, B.A., Ed.

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And of the union of flutes with the lyre (for that concert has often been a great delight to us ourselves), Ephippus, in his Traffic, speaks as follows:—

Clearly, O youth, the music of the flute,
And that which from the lyre comes, does suit
Well with our pastimes; for when each resound
In unison with the feelings of those present,
Then is the greatest pleasure felt by all.

And the exact meaning of the word συναυλία is shown by Semus the Delian, in the fifth book of his Delias, where he writes—“But as the term 'concert' (συναυλία) is not understood by many people, we must speak of it. It is wren there is a union of the flute and of rhythm in alternation, without any words accompanying the melody.” And Antiphanes explains it very neatly in his Flute-player, where he says— [p. 986]

Tell me, I pray you, what this concert (ἡ συναυλία αἵτη) was
Which he did give you. For you know; but they
Having well learnt, still played.¹. . . . . . .
* * * * *
A concert of sweet sounds, apart from words,
Is pleasant, and not destitute of meaning.

But the poets frequently call the flute “the Libyan flute,” as Duris remarks in the second book of his History of Agathocles, because Seirites, who appears to have been the first inventor of the art of flute-playing, was a Libyan, of one of the Nomad tribes; and he was the first person who played airs on the flute in the festival of Cybele." And the different kinds of airs which can be played on the flute (as Tryphon tells us in the second book of his treatise on Names) have the following names:—the Comus, the Bucoliasmus, the Gingras, the Tetracomus, the Epiphallus, the Choreus, the Callinicus, the Martial, the Hedycomus, the Sicynnotyrbe, the Thyrocopicum, which is the same as the Crousithyrum (or Door-knocker), the Cnismus, the Mothon. And all these airs on the flute, when played, were accompanied with dancing.