Music in Ancient Israel/Palestine: Archaeological, Written, and Comparative Sources.

• Author: Kilmer, Anne Draffkorn
• Position: Book Review

By JOACHIM BRAUN. Translated by Douglas W. Stott. The Bible in its World. Grand Rapids, Mich.: WM. B. EERDMANS PUBLISHING CO., 2002. Pp. xxxvi + 368, illustrations. $30.00, 21.95 [pounds sterling].

As Braun tells us in his preface, this English translation of the 1999 publication of his Die Musikkultur Altisraels/Palastinas (see the review in JAOS 122.3) "is a revised, updated, and enlarged version" of the original German publication. For those who prefer English for their reading pleasure, this excellent translation provides all the comprehensiveness of the original, with the added benefit of a somewhat simplified format with respect to the placement of illustrations together with less complex sub-chapter headings that refer to the illustrations.

Tables 1 and 2 are printed larger and are easier to use. In table 1, a typology of all music archaeological finds, the tallies appear to have been recounted so that some of the totals here differ slightly from those in the German book. Some of table 2's lyre contours have been redrawn by Aviva Breitbord-Braun (whose illustrations throughout are to be admired), a slightly different ordering and numbering has been given to the contours after no. 5, no. 33 is a new drawing after a 1996 publication, and no. 34 has been added as well. Whereas all the tables and illustrations in the original book were placed at the end, this version's illustrations are inserted with their captions into the chapters in which they are discussed. The numbering of the plates has been simplified while some numbering has changed. Illustration II.4, an imaginative drawing of a man swinging a bullroarer, is new; a few of the old illustrations have been eliminated, and there are a few new plates. There are also minor changes...