Billy Ó Foghlú, a Ph.D. student at the Australian National University’s College of Asia-Pacific, has created a replica of an Iron-Age artifact to revive a musical culture in ancient Ireland.
Billy Ó Foghlú. Image credit: Stuart Hay / Australian National University.
When Ó Foghlú used the replica artifact as a mouthpiece, the ancient Irish horn had a richer, more velvety tone.
“Suddenly the instrument came to life. These horns were not just hunting horns or noisemakers. They were very carefully constructed and repaired, they were played for hours,” said Ó Foghlú, who is an author of a paper accepted for publication in the journal Emania.
“Music clearly had a very significant role in the culture.”
Complex Bronze-Age and Iron-Age horns have been found throughout Europe, especially in Scandinavia.
However, the lack of mouthpieces in Ireland suggested the Irish music scene had drifted into a musical dark age.
Ó Foghlú was convinced mouthpieces had existed in Ireland, and was intrigued by the so-called Conical Spearbutt of Navan.
Although the scientist could not gain access to the original artifact, he used the exact measurements to produce a replica using 3D-printing and try it out with his own horn.
The addition of a mouthpiece would have given greater comfort and control to ancient horn players, and may have increased the range of their instruments.
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Billy Ó Foghlú. 2015. Irish Iron Age Horns, and the Conical Spearbutt of Navan: A Mouthpiece Investigation. Emania – Bulletin of the Navan Research Group, 22
