Universal Music-making (Musurgia Universalis), Volume I

From the library of Saint Catherine of Paris

A highly detailed allegorical copperplate engraving serves as the frontispiece. At the top center, the Eye of Providence is enclosed within a triangle of light, radiating beams over a celestial assembly of cherubim. Below this, two large winged angels fly, holding a long, flowing banner that contains musical staves and notes for a complex canon. In the middle of the composition, a personification of Music sits majestically atop a large celestial globe. She is crowned with laurel and holds a lyre in her left arm and a pan flute in her right hand. The globe itself serves as a title plaque and features astronomical diagrams of the zodiac and planetary orbits. The lower half of the page shows a landscape. On the left, a bearded philosopher, traditionally identified as Pythagoras, sits by a stone block inscribed with a numerical grid; he points a staff toward a cave. Inside the cave, three muscular men, representing the blacksmiths of the Pythagoras legend, strike an anvil with hammers to produce musical tones. In the center background, a small pastoral scene shows a shepherd and a group of people dancing in a ring. On the right, another female figure sits surrounded by a variety of musical instruments, including lutes, trumpets, and organ pipes.

original: "Sanctus Sanctus Sanctus." This refers to the Trisagion or the seraphic hymn from the Book of Isaiah.

The full title is "Universal Music-making, or the Great Art of Consonance and Dissonance." The term Musurgia is a Greek-derived word used by Kircher to describe the systematic study or composition of music.

original: "quis concentum cæli dormire faciet." This biblical verse is interpreted here to mean that the celestial movements are an eternal, unsleeping music.

This magic square or numerical grid relates to the mathematical proportions found in musical intervals and the legend of Pythagoras.

original: "pascite ut ante boves." This is a quote from Virgil's Eclogues, representing a return to pastoral peace and natural harmony.