18.12.24: level 1; topic; school [7]; Music [3]: What did Nero tuck beneath his armpits?

“It is with the Emperor Nero, in the first century A.D. that we have the first definite mention of the bag applied to reed pipes. His use of a bag is actually confirmed by Dio Chrysdstom who mentions Nero's use of the bagpipe in the second half of the first century A.D: “they say that he could … play the pipe, both by means of his lips and by tucking a skin beneath his armpits​”

https://www.bagpipehistory.info/rome-ancient-world.shtml

[i] utriculārius, -ī [2/m], the word used by Suetonius in the previous post, is a bagpipe player, not the instrument; the word is obviously derived from: utriculus, -ī [2/m]: a small skin / leather bag

The other word used to describe a bagpipe player is:

[ii] ascaulēs, ascaulis [3/m] from Gk. ἀσκαύλης [askaulis], created from [i] Gk. αὐλός [aulos], a wind instrument resembling an oboe, and [ii] Gk. ἀσκός [askos]: a skin made into a bag; the Roman poet Martial refers to this in one of his epigrams.

The two terms that now refer to the instrument itself are:

[i] utriculus, -ī [2/m] (i.e. the same word that originally described the small leather bag)

Schöttgen, Christian (1687-1751) asks the question: An instrumentum Davidis musicum fuerit utriculus? │ Was David’s musical instrument a bagpipe? 

According to Biblical sources, David played a lyre for King Saul but that’s not the point: this author is arguing that it may not have been, and could have been a bagpipe. I have no idea why he thinks that and I’m not going there.

[ii] There is another reference to the instrument in 1512:

tībia utriculāris: ain [= ein] sackpfeif(e); a bagpipe; bagpipes

It does seem that in the Middle Ages, animals were big fans of bagpipes! And, when you’re looking at those images, if you’re thinking what I think you might be thinking, then your thinking is right!

“Musical instruments could also invoke sexuality for a medieval audience. Wind instruments like flutes and bagpipes were seen to resemble male genitalia, stringed instruments had the curving body of a woman to be played, and percussion instruments like drums were to be "banged," while cymbals and bells kept erotic rhythms.”

https://dca.lib.tufts.edu/caviness/chapter3.html