Project description
Understanding music’s role in Arabic scientific culture
What was music’s role in Arabic scientific culture? Up until now, its significance within this scientific tradition remains poorly understood. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the ARAMUS project will examine the way that diagrams enabled conceptual communication across pre-modern boundaries between disciplines and languages, focusing on al-Farabi’s The Great Book of Music, an essential treatise on medieval Arabic music composed in Baghdad around the 10th century. By studying media and manuscript traditions, the ARAMUS project will place al-Farabi’s musical diagrams in the context of other scientific diagrams in astronomy, medicine and arithmetic, as well as related texts by Boethius and Ptolemy.
Objective
This project examines how diagrams served as vehicles of intellectual exchange across premodern disciplinary and linguistic boundaries. Music theorists have long relied on diagrams to make abstract sonic concepts visible and graspable. The project takes as its point of departure al-Farabi’s Great Book of Music (Baghdad, 10th century), the most influential treatise of the medieval Arabic tradition. Drawing on media and manuscript studies, it pursues two comparative strategies to trace both the distinctive features and shared visual logics of Arabic musical diagrams: first, situating al-Farabi’s musical diagrams within broader diagrammatic practices in Arabic sciences, such as astronomy, medicine, and arithmetic; and second, setting them alongside visualizations in related Latin and Greek music-theoretical works: Boethius’ Fundamentals of Music (Rome, c. 480–Pavia, 524) and Ptolemy’s Harmonics (Alexandria, 2nd century CE). By interrogating how visual strategies enabled recognition and exchange across traditions usually studied in isolation, ARAMUS redefines the place of music within Arabic scientific culture and reframes music theory as an inherently cross-cultural enterprise.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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Call for proposal
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2025-PF
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20148 Hamburg
Germany
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