Historical Development of Indian Music: A Critical Study c8.34

c8.34

¹ Stuart Piggot says: ‘Cymbals were used to accompany dancing, * * there were reed flutes or pipes, a stringed instrument of the lute class, and a harp or lyre, which is mentioned as having seven tones or notes * *. There is good evidence that these instruments were constucted according to the heptatonic scale (seven notes) * *.’—*Cf. Prehistoric India* (1950), pp. 270-271. Rāi Bāhādur K. N. Dīkṣit says: ‘Some of the pictographs appear to be representations of a crude stringed instrument, a prototype of the modern *vīṇā*; while a pair of castanets, like the modern *karatāla*, have also been found’.—*Cf. Prehistoric Civilization of the Iudus Valley* (Madras. 1939), p. 30.