A sonnet is a fourteen line poem devoted to a single theme. Sonnets were first invented in Italy in the 13th century and were then a form of elegiac verse. They were perfected by Alighieri Dante and Petrarch, the regular or Petrarcan sonnet consisting of fourteen iambic lines of ten or eleven syllables, the first eight or octave generally devoted to the expression of the theme, having the rhyme-scheme abbaabba, and the last six, or sestet, containing the application of the idea, with two or three rhymes variously arranged, a closing couplet being avoided. In England many irregular forms of sonnet were used, the chief being the Shakespearean sonnet, rhyming ababcdefefgg. Milton used the Petrarcan form, but ignored the break after the eighth line. Research Sonnet
Trinity Sunday, the octave of Pentecost, is a feast of very early institution. The name
Trinity Sunday is found in the English Breviary and missal since the time of St Oswald. Research Trinity Sunday
Octave Feuillet was a French author. He was born in 1821 at Saint Lo and died in 1890. He became noticed about 1846 with his novels of Le Fruit Defendu, Le Conte de Polichinelle, and a series of comedies and tales which were published in the Revue des deux Mondes. In 1857 the appearance of Le Roman d'un Jeune Homme Pauvre raised Octave Feuillet to the first rank of the novelists of the day. Amongst his other numerous novels are Monsieur de Camors (1867), Julia de Trecoeur (1872), Le Sphinx (1874), Histoire d'une Parisienne (1881), etc. His works earned great praise and the favour of the Napoleonic Court. Research Octave Feuillet
Sir Thomas Octave Sopwith was a British airmen and inventor. He was born in 1888 at London and died in 1989. Educated at Cottesmore and Seafield Engineering College he developed an interest in aviation and aircraft design. In 1910 he won the Baron de Forest prize for a flight from England to the Continent, and in 1911 he founded the Sopwith Aviation and Engineering Company Ltd at Kingston on Thames, to design and build aeroplanes and seaplanes. In 1918 he was made a CBE. In 1925 he became chairman of the Society of British Aircraft Constructors, a post he held until 1927 and chairman, later President, of the Hawker Siddeley Group in 1935 and 1963. He was knighted in 1953. Among his famous aircraft that served in the British armed forces during the Great War were the Sopwith Pup and Sopwith Camel. Research Thomas Sopwith
Acoustics is the experimental and theoretical science of sound and hearing, and especially the phenomena of sound in space, such as buildings.
Acoustics teaches the cause, nature, and phenomena of such vibrations of elastic
bodies as affect the organ of hearing; the manner in which sound is produced, its transmission through air and other media, the doctrine of reflected sound or echoes, the properties and effects of different sounds, including musical sounds or notes, and the structure and action of the organ of hearing, etc. The propagation of sound is analogous to that of light, both being due to vibrations which produce successive waves, and Isaac Newton was the first to show that its propagation through any medium depended upon the elasticity of that medium. Regarding the intensity, reflection, and refraction of sound, much the same rules apply as in light. In ordinary cases of hearing the vibrating medium is air, but all substances capable of vibrating may be employed to propagate and convey sound. When a bell is struck its vibrations are communicated to the particles of air surrounding it, and from these to particles outside them, until they reach the ear of the listener. The intensity of sound varies inversely as the square of the distance of the body sounding from the ear. Sound travels through the air at the rate of about 332 metres per second; through water at the rate of about 1433 metres.
Sounds may be musical or non-musical. A musical sound is caused by a regular series of exactly similar pulses succeeding each other at precisely equal intervals of time. If these conditions are not fulfilled the sound is a noise. Musical sounds are comparatively simple, and are combined to give pleasing sensations according to easy numerical relations. The loudness of a note depends on the degree to which it affects the ear; the pitch of a note depends on the number of vibrations to the second which produce the note; the timbre, quality, or character of a note depends on the body or bodies whose vibrations produce the sound, and is due to the form of the paths of vibrating particles. The gamut is a series of eight notes, which are called by the names Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Si, Do, and the numbers of vibrations which produce these notes are respectively proportional to 24, 27, 30, 32, 36, 40, 45, 48. The numerical value of the interval between any two notes is given by dividing one of the above numbers corresponding to the higher note by the number corresponding to the lower note. The intervals from Do to each of the others are called a second, a major third, a fourth, a, fifth, a sixth, a seventh, and an octave respectively. The interval from La to Do is a minor third. An interval of nine eights is a major tone; ten ninths is a minor tone; sixteen fifteenths is called a limma.
In audio engineering, white noise is a random noise that contains an equal amount of energy per frequency band. That is, 100-200, 800-900, and 3000-3100. Pink noise has an equal amount of energy per octave. The bands 100-200, 800-1600, and 3000-6000 all contain the same amount of energy. Research White Noise
The archlute was a double-necked stringed musical instrument of the lute family. It had the bass strings doubled with an octave, and the higher strings with a unison. Research Archlute
In music, the term authentic describes something as having as immediate relation to the tonic, in distinction from plagal, which has a correspondent relation to the dominant in the octave below the tonic.
The bagpipe is a musical wind-instrument of very great antiquity, having been used among the ancient Greeks, and being a favourite instrument over Europe generally in the 15th century. It still continues in use among the country people of Poland, Italy, the south of France, and in Scotland and Ireland. Though now often regarded as the national instrument of Scotland, especially Celtic Scotland, it is only Scottish by adoption, being introduced into that country from England. It consists of a leathern bag, which receives the air from the mouth, or from bellows; and of pipes, into which the air is pressed from the bag by the performer's elbow. In the common or Highland form one pipe (called the chanter) plays the melody; of the three others (called drones) two are in unison with the lowest A of the chanter, and the third and longest an octave lower, the sound being produced by means of reeds. The chanter has eight holes, which the performer stops and opens at pleasure, but the scale is imperfect and the tone harsh. The Highland bagpipe is a powerful instrument, and calls for great exertion of the lungs in order that the air may be supplied in sufficient quantity. There are several other species of bagpipes, as the soft and melodious Irish bagpipe, supplied with wind by a bellows, and having several keyed drones and a keyed chanter; the old English bagpipe (now no longer used); the Italian bagpipe, a very rude instrument, etc. The Irish bagpipe is, musically speaking, the most perfect of all. Research Bagpipe
The banjo is a stringed musical instrument. It is an American development of African origins related to the Kora etc., but with a guitar type neck. Found with 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8 or more strings, popular types are the 5 string, Tenor (4 string), Plectrum (long neck 4 string), Banjolele (Ukulele Banjo), Banjolin (Mandolin Banjo).
The banjo evolved among the negro slaves of North America and was originally a six-stringed instrument with a body like a tambourine and a neck like a guitar. The banjo is played by stopping the strings with the fingers of the left hand and twitching or striking them with the fingers of the right. The upper or octave string, however, is never stopped. Research Banjo
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Sonnet
