Athenaeus, The Deipnosophists
C. D. Yonge, B.A., Ed.

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But Heraclides of Pontus, in the third book of his treatise on Music, says—"Now that harmony ought not to be called Phrygian, just as it has no right either to be called Lydian. For there are three harmonies; as there are also three different races of Greeks-Dorians, Aeolians, and] Ionians: and accordingly there is no little difference between their manners. The Lacedæmonians are of all the Dorians the most strict in maintaining their national customs and the Thessalians (and these are they who were the origin of the [p. 996] Aeolian race) have preserved at all times very nearly the same customs and institutions; but the population of the Ionians has been a great deal changed, and has gone through many transitions, because they have at all times resembled whatever nations of barbarians have from time to time been their masters. Accordingly, that species of melody which the Dorians composed they called the Dorian harmony, and that which the Aeolians used to sing they named the Aeolian harmony, and the third they called the Ionian, because they heard the Ionians sing it.

"Now the Dorian harmony is a manly and high-sounding strain, having nothing relaxed or merry in it, but, rather, it is stern and vehement, not admitting any great variations or any sudden changes. The character of the Aeolian harmony is pompous and inflated, and full of a sort of pride; and these characteristics are very much in keeping with the fondness for breeding horses and for entertaining strangers which the people itself exhibits. There is nothing mean in it, but the style is elevated and fearless; and therefore we see that a fondness for banquets and for amorous indulgences is common to the whole nation, and they indulge in every sort of relaxation: on which account they cherish the style of the Sub-Dorian harmony; for that which they call the Aeolian is, says Heraclides, a sort of modification of the Dorian, and is called ὑποδώριος.. And we may collect the character of this Aeolian harmony also from what Lasus of Hermione says in his hymn to the Ceres in Hermione, where he speaks as follows:—

I sing the praise of Ceres and of Proserpine,
The sacred wife of Clymenus, Melibœa;
Raising the heavy-sounding harmony
Of hymns Aeolian.

But these Sub-Dorian songs, as they are called, are sung by nearly everybody. Since, then, there is a Sub-Dorian melody, it is with great propriety that Lasus speaks of Aeolian harmony. Pratinas, too, somewhere or other says—

Aim not at too sustain'd a style, nor yet
At the relax'd Ionian harmony;
But draw a middle furrow through your ground,
And follow the Eolian muse in preference.

And in what comes afterwards he speaks more plainly—-

But to all men who wish to raise their voices,
The Aeolian harmony's most suitable.

[p. 997] "Now formerly, as I have said, they used to call this the Aeolian harmony, but afterwards they gave it the name of the Sub-Dorian, thinking, as some people say, that it was pitched lower on the flute than the Dorian. But it appears to me that those who gave it this name, seeing its inflated style, and the pretence to valour and virtue which was put forth in the style of the harmony, thought it not exactly the Dorian harmony, but to a certain extent like it: on which account they called it ὑποδώριον, just as they call what is nearly white ὑπόλευκον: and what is not absolutely sweet, but something near it, we call ὑπόγλυκυ; so, too, we call what is not thoroughly Dorian ὑπόδωριον.