History of Primitive and Non-Western Trumpets - Arab and Persian

Arab and Persian

After the fall of the Western Empire in 476, the trumpet disappeared from Europe for more than half a millennium. Elsewhere the art of bending long metal tubes was lost, for the trumpets of the succeeding era lacked the characteristic G-like curve of the cornu and buccina. The straight-tubed Roman tuba, however, continued to flourish in the Middle East among the Sassanids and their Arabic successors. The Saracens, whose long metal trumpets greatly impressed the Christian armies at the time of the Crusades, were ultimately responsible for reintroducing the instrument to Europe after a lapse of six hundred years.

During the last centuries of the Roman Empire the name buccina was widely used throughout the Near East to denote a particular type of straight trumpet similar to, and probably derived from, the Roman tuba. From this, undoubtedly, derives the generic term būq, which first occurs after 800; this was the name used by the Arabs to describe a variety of both trumpet-like and horn-like instruments. The būq al-nafīr (“buc of war”) was a long straight metal trumpet used in the military bands of the Abbasid period (750–1258) and thereafter; by the 14th century it could be as much as two metres long. From the 11th century, this term was used to denote any long straight trumpet.

Other Arabic words for trumpets of various sizes and shapes include qarnā and sūr; the latter is the name used in the Qur'an for the Last Trump that will announce Judgment Day. The qarnā is thought to be a descendant of the ancient Mesopotamian instrument of the same name.

The Saracens are sometimes said to be the first people to make brass trumpets from hammered sheet, though this is not at all certain.

Many of the long, straight metal trumpets that first appeared around this time were associated with the spread of Islam. In Africa, for example, end-blown metal trumpets are found only in Islamic regions such as Nigeria, Chad and central Cameroon. Known as kakaki (among the Hausa of Nigeria) or gashi (in Chad), these trumpets consist of narrow cylindrical tubes, sometimes over two metres in length, with flared metal bells. The silver nafiri is one of only two trumpets found in Malaysia; its name clearly derives from the Arabic būq al-nafīr. Slightly less than one metre long, a single nafiri is present in each of the royal nobat ensembles maintained by the local sultans. As in Africa, these royal ensembles play on ceremonial occasions and Islamic holidays.