Ch. 32.The Reception of Greek Music Theory in the Middle Ages: Boethius and the Portraits of Ancient Musicians

After an overview of the major inheritances of the Greek music theory in the Byzantine, Arab and Latin worlds, the paper examines Boethius’ De institutione musica, the most influential work of music theory in Latin Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Attention is paid to how Boethius describes the ancient methodological approaches to musical sciences, starting with Pythagoras, and their presence in medieval treatises. The last section deals with the reception of Ptolemy, Aristoxenus and the pseudo-Aristotelian Problemata in the late Middle Ages.