This passage from the De gestis Caroli Magni by the Monk of Saint Gall describes the arrival at the Carolingian court of instruments from the Byzantine world, including several organs. The text contains references to the construction of the instrument, the bellows, the bronze pipes and the acoustic characteristics attributed to the organ within Carolingian musical culture.
A GREEK ORGAN
7. And here I must repeat that the most celebrated Charles had men of the greatest intelligence in every field.
When Matins were celebrated before the Emperor on the octave of the Epiphany, the Greeks privately proceeded to sing to God, in their language, psalms with the same melody and the same content as “Veteraem hominem” and the words that follow it in our missal.
The Emperor then ordered one of his chaplains, who understood the Greek language, to adapt that psalm into Latin to the same melody, and to take particular care that to each individual note there should correspond a single syllable, so that Latin and Greek should resemble each other as closely as possible, insofar as the nature of the two languages permitted. Thus it came about that all were written with the same rhythm, and in one of them conteruit was substituted for confrivit.
These same Greek envoys brought with them every kind of organ, in addition to other instruments of various kinds. All were secretly examined by the craftsmen of the most wise Charles, and then reproduced with precision. The foremost among them was that organ of the musicians, in which the great chests were made of bronze; and bellows of cowhide blew through bronze pipes, while the deep sound was like the roar of thunder, and in its sweetness it equalled the tinkling of the lyre or the cymbal.
But I must not, here and now, speak of where it was placed, of how long it lasted, and of how it was lost at the same time as other calamities befell the State.
