Music from Ancient Meroe : Reconstructing Queen Amanishakheto's Auloi

This volume presents the results of a research and conservation project on the auloi of Meroë. This cache of ancient wind instruments from the late first century BCE was discovered in northern Sudan, in the tomb of Queen Amanishakheto. It has long been recognized as an important testimony to the music of classical antiquity.

In 1921, the Harvard University-Museum of Fine Arts Expedition to Meroë in the northern Sudan excavated a cache of ancient wind instruments in the tomb of Queen Amanishakheto from the late first century BCE. Although recognized as important testimonies to the music of classical antiquity at the moment of discovery, the instruments were highly deteriorated and fragmented. Over decades, scholars attempted to understand the find, but the sheer number of fragments had made a meaningful interpretation almost hopeless—until now. This volume presents the results of a twelve-year-long research and conservation project on the auloi of Meroë. It offers a contextualized narrative of discovery, detailed documentation of the cache, and the technical and musical interpretations of the twelve pipes. It serves readers with various interests, ranging from Nubia and the ancient Nile Valley through the histories of music and technology between the Greco-Roman world and the Empire of Kush, and particularly the community of scholars and practitioners of the aulos.