The water organ or hydraulic organ (early types are sometimes called hydraulis or hydraulos or hydraulus or hydraula) is a type of automatic pipe organ blown by air, where the power source pushing the air is derived by water from a natural source (e.g. by a waterfall). Consequently, the water organ lacks a bellows, blower, or compressor. In addition to being the source of power to push air through the organ pipes, the water is also used as a source of power to drive a mechanism similar to that of the Barrel organ, which has a pinned barrel that contains a specific song to be played. Organ in Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany // The pipe organ is a musical (keyboard) instrument that produces sound by admitting pressurized air through a series of pipes. ... Hopetoun Falls near Otway National Park, Victoria, Australia A waterfall is usually a geological formation resulting from water, often in the form of a stream, flowing over an erosion-resistant rock formation that forms a sudden break in elevation. ... Hand bellows The bellows is a device for delivering pressured air in a controlled quantity to a controlled location. ... Blower may refer to the Blower, a fish of the Atlantic coast of the United States and the West Indies USS Blower, a Balao class submarine of the United States Navy an old-fashioned slang term for the Telephone, especially in the UK a ducted fan, usually part of some... Compressor has several meanings: A gas compressor is a mechanical device that takes in a gas and increases its pressure by squeezing a volume of it into a smaller volume. ... A barrel organ player in Vienna, Austria. ...

Hydraulis

A hydraulis is an early type of pipe organ that operated by converting the dynamic energy of water (hýdōr in Greek) into air pressure to drive the pipes. Hence its name hydraulis, literally "water (driven) pipe (instrument)." It is attributed to the Hellenistic scientist Ctesibius of Alexandria, an engineer of the 3rd century BC. See more about the Hydraulis and its further development in pipe organ. The hydraulis was the world's first keyboard instrument, and was, in fact the predecessor of the modern church organ. Unlike the instrument of the Renaissance period which is the main subject of this article, the ancient hydraulis was played by hand, not automatically by the water-flow; the keys were balanced and could be played with a light touch, as is clear from the reference in a Latin poem by Claudian (late 4th century), who uses this very phrase (magna levi detrudens murmura tactu . . . intonet, “let him thunder forth as he presses out mighty roarings with a light touch”) (Paneg. Manlio Theodoro, 320-22). See organ (music) for more details and external links. Organ in Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany // The pipe organ is a musical (keyboard) instrument that produces sound by admitting pressurized air through a series of pipes. ... The term Hellenistic (established by the German historian Johann Gustav Droysen) in the history of the ancient world is used to refer to the shift from a culture dominated by ethnic Greeks, however scattered geographically, to a culture dominated by Greek-speakers of whatever ethnicity, and from the political dominance... Ctesibius or Ktesibios or Tesibius (working 285–222 BC) of Alexandria (Greek Κτησίβιος) was an inventor and mathematician in ancient Greece. ... Organ in Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany // The pipe organ is a musical (keyboard) instrument that produces sound by admitting pressurized air through a series of pipes. ... For other uses, see Renaissance (disambiguation). ... Claudius Claudianus, Anglicized as Claudian, was the court poet to the Emperor Honorius and Stilicho. ... Organ in Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany Modern style pipe organ at the concert hall of Aletheia University in Matou, Taiwan The organ is a keyboard instrument with one or more manuals, and usually a pedalboard. ...

Mechanics

Both water and air arrive together in the camera aeolis (wind chamber). Here, water and air separate and the compressed air is driven into a wind-trunk on top of the camera aeolis, to blow the organ pipes. Two perforated ‘splash plates’ or ‘diaphragms’ prevent water spray from getting into the organ pipes.

The water, having been separated from the air, leaves the camera aeolis at the same rate as it enters. It then drives a water wheel, which in turn drives the musical cylinder and the movements attached. To start the organ, the tap above the entry pipe is turned on and, given a continuous flow of water, the organ plays until the tap is closed again.

Many water organs had simple wind-pressure regulating devices. At the Palazzo del Quirinale, the water flows from a hilltop spring (once abundant, now only sufficient to play the organ for about 30 minutes at a time), coursing through the palace itself into a stabilizing ‘room’ some 18 metres above the camera aeolis in the organ grotto. This drop provides sufficient wind to power the restored six-stop instrument. The Quirinal Palace once housed popes, and then kings, and now presidents The Quirinal Palace (known in Italian as the Quirinale) is the official residence of the President of the Italian Republic upon the Quirinal Hill, one of the seven hills of Rome. ...

Among Renaissance writers on the water organ, Salomon de Caus was particularly informative. His book of 1615 includes a short treatise on making water organs, advice on tuning and registration, and many fine engravings showing the instruments, their mechanisms and scenes in which they were used. It also includes an example of suitable music for water organ, the madrigal Chi farà fed' al cielo by Alessandro Striggio, arranged by Peter Philips. For other uses, see Renaissance (disambiguation). ... Salomon de Caus (born 1576 in Dieppe; died 1626) was a French engineer and once (falsely) credited with the development of the steam engine. ... Alessandro Striggio (c. ... Peter Philips (c 1560–1628) was an eminent English composer, organist, and Catholic priest exiled to Flanders after the start of the Protestant Reformation. ...

History

Water organs were described in the numerous writings of the famous Ctesibius (3rd century BC), Philo of Byzantium (3rd century BC) and Hero of Alexandria (c. 62 AD). Like the water clocks (clepsydra) of Plato's time, they were not regarded as playthings but might have had a particular significance in Greek philosophy, which made use of models and simulacra of this type. Hydraulically blown organ pipes were used to imitate birdsong, as well as to produce the awe-inspiring sound emitted by Memnon's statue at Thebes. For the latter, solar heat was used to syphon water from one closed tank into another, thereby producing compressed air for sounding the pipes. Ctesibius (Ktesibius) (working 285 - 222 BC) of Alexandria (Greek Κτησίβιος) was second only to Archimedes as an inventor and mathematician. ... Philo of Byzantium, Greek writer on mechanics, nourished during the latter half of the 2nd century B.C. (according to some, a century earlier). ... Heros aeolipile Hero (or Heron) of Alexandria (c. ... Clepsydra may refer to An ancient type of clock: see Clepsydra (clock) An invertebrate: see Clepsydra (animal) This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ...

Arab and Byzantine engineers developed, among other pieces, an automatic water organ (described by the Banu Musa in their 9th-century treatise; see Farmer, 1931), and a 'musical tree' at the palace of Khalif al-Muqtadir (ruled 908–32). By the end of the 13th century hydraulic automata had reached Italy and the rest of Western Europe. During the Renaissance water organs again acquired magical and metaphysical connotations among followers of the hermetic and esoteric sciences. Organs were placed in gardens, grottoes and conservatories of royal palaces and the mansions of rich patricians to delight onlookers not only with music but also with displays of automata – dancing figurines, wing-flapping birds and hammering cyclopes – all operated by projections on the musical cylinder. Other types of water organ were played out of sight and were used to simulate musical instruments apparently being played by statues in mythological scenes such as 'Orpheus playing the viol', 'The contest between Apollo and Marsyas' and 'Apollo and the nine Muses'. The Banu Musa (Persian for Children of Musa, sometimes transliterated Bana Musa) brothers were three Arab scholars, of Baghdad, active in the House of Wisdom: Muhammad bin Musa (800-873), who specialised in geometry and astronomy Ahmad bin Musa (805-873), who specialised in mechanics Hasan bin Musa (810–873... Al-Muqtadir (Arabic: المقتدر ) (d. ... Table of Hydraulics and Hydrostatics, from the 1728 Cyclopaedia. ... A Grotto (Italian grotta), when it is not an artificial garden feature, is a cave, small or quite large, usually near water and often flooded or liable to flood at high tide. ... This page is about the mythical creatures. ... The head of Orpheus, from an 1865 painting by Gustave Moreau. ... Various sizes of viol, from Michael Praetorius Syntagma musicum (1618) The viol (also called viola da gamba) is any one of a family of bowed, fretted stringed musical instruments developed in the 1400s and used primarily in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. ... Lycian Apollo, early Imperial Roman copy of a fourth century Greek original (Louvre Museum) In Greek and Roman mythology, Apollo (Ancient Greek , Apóllōn; or , Apellōn), the ideal of the kouros, was the archer-god of medicine and healing, light, truth, archery and also a bringer of death... In Greek mythology, Marsyas was a satyr who challenged Apollo to a contest of music. ... The Nine Muses, Or, Poems Written by Nine severall Ladies Upon the death of the late Famous John Dryden, Esq. ...

The most famous water organ of the 16th century was at the Villa d'Este in Tivoli. Built about 1569–72 by Lucha Clericho (Luc de Clerc; completed by Claude Venard), it stood about six metres high under an arch, and was fed by a magnificent waterfall; it was described by Mario Cartaro in 1575 as playing 'madrigals and many other things'. G. M. Zappi (Annalie memorie de Tivoli, 1576) wrote: 'When somebody gives the order to play, at first one hears trumpets which play awhile and then there is a consonance …. Countless gentlemen could not believe that this organ played by itself, according to the registers, with water, but they rather thought that there was somebody inside'. Besides automatically playing at least three pieces of music, it is now known that the organ was also provided with a keyboard. Park of the Villa dEste, Carl Blechen, 1830 The gardens at the Villa dEste The Villa dEste is a masterpiece of Italian architecture and garden design. ... Tivoli, the classical Tibur, is an ancient Italian town in Lazio, some 20 km from Rome, at the falls of the Aniene river, where it issues from the Sabine hills. ... A madrigal is a setting for 4–6 voices of a secular text, often in Italian. ...

Other Italian gardens with water organs were at Pratolino, near Florence (c. 1575), Isola de Belvedere, Ferrara (before 1599), Palazzo del Quirinale, Rome (built by Luca Biagi in 1598, restored 1990), Villa Aldobrandini, Frascati (1620), one of the Royal Palaces at Naples (1746), Villa Doria Pamphili, Rome (1758–9). Of these only the one at the Palazzo del Quirinale has survived. Kircher's illustration in Musurgia universalis (1650), long thought to be a fanciful representation of a hypothetical possibility, has been found to be accurate in every detail when compared to the organ grotto at the Quirinale, except that it was reversed left to right. There are still traces of the instrument at the Villa d'Este but the mineral-rich water of the river which cascades through the organ grotto has caused accretions which have hidden most of the evidence from view. Ferrara is a city in Emilia-Romagna, Italy, capital city of the province of Ferrara. ... The Quirinal Palace once housed popes, and then kings, and now presidents The Quirinal Palace (known in Italian as the Quirinale) is the official residence of the President of the Italian Republic upon the Quirinal Hill, one of the seven hills of Rome. ... This article needs to be wikified. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Villa Doria Pamphili, on the Gianicolo, the Roman Janiculum, is the largest (180 hectares) public landscaped park of Rome, bought in 1965–1971 by the City of Rome from the Doria-Pamphilj family—the family favor the orthography of the long i. ... Athanasius Kircher Athanasius Kircher (sometimes spelt Kirchner) (May 2, 1601?–27 November 1680) was a 17th century German Jesuit scholar who published around 40 works, most notably in the fields of oriental studies, geology and medicine. ...

In the early 17th century water organs were built in England; Cornelius Drebbel built one for King James I (see Harstoffer, 1651), and Salomon de Caus built several at Richmond while in the service of Prince Henry. There was one in Bagnigge Vale, London, the summer home of Nell Gwynn (1650–87), and Henry Winstanley (1644–1703), the designer of the Eddystone Lighthouse, is thought to have built one at his home in Saffron Walden, Essex. After the marriage of Princess Elizabeth to the Elector Palatine Prince Friedrich V, de Caus laid out for them the gardens at Heidelberg Castle which became famous for their beautiful and intricate waterworks. A water organ survives in the gardens at Heilbronn, Württemberg, and parts of one at the Wilhelmshöhe gardens in Kassel. The brothers Francini constructed waterworks and organs at Saint Germain-en-Laye and Versailles, which reached new heights of splendour and extravagance. Cornelius Jacobszoon Drebbel (Alkmaar, 1572 - London, November 7, 1633) was the Dutch inventor of the first navigable submarine in 1620. ... Salomon de Caus (born 1576 in Dieppe; died 1626) was a French engineer and once (falsely) credited with the development of the steam engine. ... Nell Gwyn (or Gwynn or Gwynne), (February 1650 - 14 November 1687), the most famous of the many mistresses of King Charles II, was called pretty, witty Nell by Samuel Pepys. ... Henry Winstanley (1644–November 27, 1703) was an English engineer. ... The Eddystone Lighthouse is situated some 9 miles (15km) South West of Rame Head Cornwall, England on the treacherous Eddystone Rocks 50°10. ... Statistics Population: 15,095 Ordnance Survey OS grid reference: TL539385 Administration District: Uttlesford Shire county: Essex Region: East of England Constituent country: England Sovereign state: United Kingdom Other Ceremonial county: Essex Historic county: Essex Services Police force: Essex Police Fire and rescue: {{{Fire}}} Ambulance: East of England Post office and... This article is being translated, so some or all of this article may be in another language. ... View of the Heilbronn centre of town toward the Wartberg. ... Arms of the Kingdom of Württemberg The title of this article contains the character ü. Where it is unavailable or not desired, the name may be represented as Wuerttemberg. ... A palace near Cassel. ... Kassel (until 1926 officially Cassel) is a city situated along the Fulda River in northern Hessen, Germany, one of the two sources of the Weser river . ... Saint-Germain-en-Laye is a city west of Paris, in the Yvelines département (of which it is a sous-préfecture), in the Ile-de-France région, in France. ... Versailles (pronounced , in French), formerly the de facto capital of the kingdom of France, is now a wealthy suburb of Paris and is still an important administrative and judicial center. ...

By the end of the 17th century, however, interest in water organs had waned. As their upkeep was costly they were left to decay and were soon forgotten; by 1920 not one survived (the so-called water organ at Hellbrunn Castle, Salzburg, is a pneumatic organ driven by hydraulically-operated bellows).

Their mechanism was subsequently misunderstood until the Dutch engineer Van Dijk pointed out in 1954 that air was supplied to the water organ by aspiration, which was the same method used in forges and smelting works in the 16th and 17th centuries. Aspiration is the process by which air is drawn into an opening into which water flows. For the water organ, a small pipe is arranged so that one end is open to the air and the other extends into a larger pipe that contains flowing water supplied by a stream, pond or stabilizing reservoir. The longer the vertical drop of the water, the more forceful the suction will be and the greater the volume of air sucked in.

Other related instruments

Whereas the water organ uses water as a source of power to push air through organ pipes, the hydraulophone, a more recently invented instrument, uses water to make the sound, as well as for the user-interface. In the hydraulophone pipe organ, water typically flows into the organ pipes. The hydraulophone is played by blocking the flow of water jets with the fingers of the user. Typically the fingers are in direct physical contact with the same water that is used to make the sound, providing the user with a high degree of musical expression. In some hydraulophones the fluid user-interface (keyboard in which each key is a water jet) is separate from the sounding mechanism which is preferably also water-based.

See also

• Calliope
• Hydraulophone

Circus calliope, lithograph by Gibson & Co. ...

Sources and notes

Further reading

• About the Ancient Hydraulis (from the Archaeology Channel)
• Hydraulus
• THE ORGAN IN CLASSICAL LITERATURE
• THE PNEUMATICS OF HERO OF ALEXANDRIA : The construction of a hydraulic organ.
• Curious facts from the organ's history
• Hydraulis : The Ancient Hydraulis and its Reconstruction
• ACM Multimedia 2005 paper on the hydraulophone

Video

• Hydraulis video (click "The Ancient Hydraulis" in the second paragraph to watch)