[Ads-l] mouth organ, harmonicon, harmonica

Sat May 13 21:28:35 UTC 2023

1830 Rhode-Island Republican (Jan. 14) 3: There has been brought to
Philadelphia, from Paris, a new musical instrument, recently invented in
Switzerland, and called Harmonica. It is delightfully sweet and exact, and
may be played with ease, and carried in the pocket. The price is three
dollars and a half.

$3.50 in 1830 is said to be equivalent in buying power to $113.00 today, so
there might not have been too many purchasers.

1863 New York Herald (Dec. 10) 12 HER[R] ZIROM...produces the most
wonderful music on the instrument he calls the EMMELYNKA commonly known as
the mouth harmonica. Ibid. (Dec. 15) 1: Herr Zirom's incredible musical
performance on the common harmonicon, known to schoolboys as the "mouth
organ."

But perhaps Zirom's "emmelynka" was no more than a set of panpipes. The
Marysville [Calif.] Daily Appeal (Oct. 23, 1862), p. 4, describes it as a
"Toy Instrument." Yet he could play on it "favorite Melodies, Airs with
variations, and Military marches, &c."

JL

On Tue, Jan 19, 2021 at 8:25 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> 1
>
> It appears that a simple predecessor of the modern harmonica was called
> the "aeolina" (OED: 1829), and that the word "harmonica" is borrowed from
> German:
>
> 1829 _Boston Traveler_ (March 17) 1: THE AEOLINA.--An elegant and very
> simple mode of producing delightful musical sounds. [The description speaks
> of a metal "plate" and blown "springs."]
>
> 1830 _Daily Chronicle_ (Phila.) (Feb. 8) 3:  HARMONICA, or AEOLINA   A
> further supply of this new and popular musical instrument, in a great
> variety of forms, received and for sale.
>
> 1830  _Evening Post_ [N.Y.] (Feb. 9) 2: The newly introduced musical toy,
> called the _Aeolina_ or _Mund harmonica_.
>
> 1830 _National Gazette and Literary Register_ [Phila.] (Feb. 12) 2:
> Instructions for the Aeolina, or Wind Harmonica, with a selection of
> popular melodies.
>
> 1830 _N.Y, American_ (Feb. 16) 1: Bourne, in Broadway,...has also a book
> out on the _Aeolina_, a new sort of mouth harp, with instructions for its
> use, and music adapted to its compass.
>
> 2
> Note the above use of "mouth harp" (OED: 1876). Cf.:
>
> 1831 _Pittsfield [Mass.] Sun_  (Feb. 3) 1: A gentleman, among a set of
> hunters at grass, in a park belonging to the Duke of Buccleugh, tried the
> effect of a small musical instrument called the mouth Aeolian harp. The
> horses...followed the musician.
>
> 3
> These seem to be true modern harmonicas (alias "French harps"):
>
> 1865 _Daily Inter-Ocean_ (Sept. 16) 3:  The shrill strains of the
> mouth-harp mingled with the roll of the drum.
>
> 1868 _Weekly Rescue_ (Sacramento, Cal.) 2: Master Frank Palmer, a lad ten
> or twelve summers old, ...played the Cincinnati hornpipe on the mouth harp,
> and played the bones at the same time with the left hand.
>
> 1869 _Cairo [Ill.] Bulletin_ (Sept. 23) 1: The instruments used were a
> single octave French mouth harp and a wheezy old hand organ.
>
> "Mouth harp" (in whatever senses) becomes relatively frequent in the 1870s.
>
> 4
> OED has "mouth harp" as a syn. for "Jew's-harp" uniquely from 1968.  But
> that may be what is meant here, considering the price (allegedly $1.87 in
> today's purchasing power):
>
> 1869 _Richmond Dispatch_ (May 10) 3: His "music box" ...[was] nothing more
> nor less than a ten-cent _mouth harp_.
>
> Since a "mouth organ" originally meant a set of panpipes, it only makes
> sense that a Jew's-harp should be called a "mouth harp."
>
> JL
>
> On Tue, Jan 19, 2021 at 6:26 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> 'Harmonica' meaning "Jew's-harp" is not in OED.
>>
>> The more I look at the various denotations "harmonica" in the 19th C.,
>> the more confusing it becomes.
>>
>> For ex., I found no unmistakable newspaper refs. to the playing of the
>> modern harmonica during the Civil War.
>>
>> And cf. this discussion: https://tinyurl.com/y6schsgp
>>
>>
>> JL
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 18, 2021 at 8:20 PM Mark Mandel <markamandel at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> In reply to Horatius and to Jonathan Lighter, respectively:
>>>
>>> ETYMOLOGY:
>>>
>>> From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jew's_harp#Etymology
>>> >>>>>
>>> There are many theories for the origin of the name Jew's harp. According
>>> to
>>> the Oxford English Dictionary, this name appears earliest in Walter
>>> Raleigh's Discouerie Guiana in 1596, spelled "Iewes Harp". The "jaw"
>>> variant is attested at least as early as 1774[8] and 1809,[9] the "juice"
>>> variant appeared only in the late 19th and 20th centuries.
>>>
>>> It has also been suggested that the name derives from the French
>>> "Jeu-trompe" meaning "toy-trumpet".[10] (Though in the French idiom, if
>>> two
>>> substantives are joined together, the qualifying noun is invariably the
>>> last.)[11]
>>>
>>> Both theories—that the name is a corruption of "jaws" or "jeu"—are
>>> described by the OED as "baseless and inept". The OED says that, "More or
>>> less satisfactory reasons may be conjectured: e.g. that the instrument
>>> was
>>> actually made, sold, or imported to England by Jews, or purported to be
>>> so;
>>> or that it was attributed to Jewish people, suggesting the trumps and
>>> harps
>>> mentioned in the Bible, and hence considered a good commercial name."[12]
>>> <<<<<
>>>
>>> "Not in OED" (though with the multiple levels of quotation I may be
>>> misinterpreting or misattributing this comment. If it is intended as "OED
>>> does not list 'Jew's-harp' as a sense of "harmonica", I apologize).
>>>
>>> It is indeed. In the Compact OED, New Edition, p. 894 (p. 232 in its
>>> original volume of the not-so-compact edition; I can't tell which volume,
>>> but it evidently begins at "interval"):
>>> >>>>>
>>> Jews' harp. (Also sometimes with small j.) A variant of Jews' trump,
>>> q.v.]
>>> <<<<<
>>> The first citation is from 1595, "R. Duddely in Hakluyt's Voy, III.576".
>>>
>>> Mark A. Mandel
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, Jan 18, 2021, 3:18 AM Horatius <
>>> 00000e76b69c74bf-dmarc-request at listserv.uga.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>> > And the "Jew's harp" name comes from the fact that the inventor is a
>>> Jew?
>>> >
>>> > Verzonden met ProtonMail Mobile
>>> >
>>> > -------- Oorspronkelijk bericht --------
>>> > Aan 18 jan. 2021 05:11, Jonathan Lighter schreef:
>>> >
>>> > > 'Harmonica'
>>> > >
>>> > > 1866: OED
>>> > >
>>> > > 1863 _New-York Herald_ (Dec. 15) 1: The common harmonicon, known to
>>> > > schoolboys as the "mouth organ."
>>> > >
>>> > > ("Harmonicon"; 1876, OED.)
>>> > >
>>> > > There are earlier exx., but they're at least as likely to refer to
>>> > panpipes
>>> > > or even Jew's-harps.
>>> > >
>>> > > II
>>> > >
>>> > > Harmonica
>>> > >
>>> > > 'Jew's-harp'
>>> > >
>>> > > Not in OED.
>>> > >
>>> > > 1825 _Caledonian Mercury_ [Edinburgh) (June 16) 2: The Jews [sic]
>>> Harp
>>> > ...
>>> > > A.M. Eulenstein, from Heilbron, has invented a new instrument, or
>>> rather
>>> > > improved the little instrument already spoken of, which he calls the
>>> > Mouth
>>> > > Harmonica, on which he has been performing various pieces of music,
>>> much
>>> > to
>>> > > the astonishment and delight of numerous private circles.
>>> > >
>>> > > JL
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
>> truth."
>>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>

-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org