ARGYROPULUS

argyropulus, or argyropulo, john (c. 1416-1486), greek humanist, one of the earliest promoters of the revival of learning in the west, was born in constantinople, and became a teacher there, constantine lascaris being his pupil. he then appears to have crossed over to italy, and taught in padua in 1434, being subsequently made rector of the university. about 1441 he returned to constantinople, but after its capture by the turks, again took refuge in italy. about 1456 he was invited to florence by cosimo de' medici, and was there appointed professor of greek in the university. in 1471, on the outbreak of the plague, he removed to rome, where he continued to act as a teacher of greek till his death. among his scholars were angelus politianus and johann reuchlin. his principal works were translations of the following portions of aristotle,--_categoriae, de interpretatione, analytica posteriora, physica, de caelo, de anima, metaphysica, ethica nicomachea, politica_; and an _expositio ethicorum aristotelis_. several of his writings exist still in manuscript. see humphrey hody, _de graecis illustribus_, 1742, and smith's _dictionary of greek and roman biography, s.v._ joannes. aria (ital. for "air"), a musical term, equivalent to the english "air," signifying a melody apart from the harmony, but especially a musical composition for a single voice or instrument, with an accompaniment of other voices or instruments. the aria originally developed from the expansion of a single vocal melody, generally on the lines of what is known as binary form (see sonata and sonata forms). accordingly, while the germs of aria form may be traceable in the highest developments of folk-song, the aria as a definite art-form could not exist before the middle of the 17th century; because up to that time the whole organization of music was based upon polyphonic principles which left no room for the development of melody for melody's sake. when at the beginning of the 17th century the monodists (see harmony and monteverde) inaugurated a new era and showed in their first experiments the enormous possibilities latent in their new art of accompanying single voices by instruments, it was natural that for many years the mere suggestiveness and variety of their experiments should suffice to retain the attention of contemporary listeners, without any real artistic coherence in the works as wholes. but, even at the outset, mere novelty of harmony, however poignant its emotional expression, was felt by the profounder spirits of the new art to be an untrustworthy guide to progress. and monteverde's famous lament of the deserted ariadne is one of many early examples that appeal to an elementary sense of form by making the last phrase identical with the first. as instrumental music grew, and the modern sense of key became strong and consistent, composers felt themselves more and more able to appeal to that sense of harmonically consistent melody which has asserted itself in folk-music before the history of harmonic music may be said to have begun. the technique of solo singers grew as rapidly as that of solo players, and composers soon found their chief musical interest in doing justice to both. in sir hubert parry's work, _the music of the 17th century (oxford history of music_, vol. iii.), will be found numerous illustrations of the early development of aria forms, from their first indications in monteverde's instinctive struggles after coherence, to their complete maturity in the works of alessandro scarlatti. by scarlatti's time it was thoroughly established that the binary form of melody was that which could best be expanded into a form which should do justice both to singers and to the players who accompanied them. thus the aria became on a small scale the prototype of the concerto; and under that heading will accordingly be found all that need be said as to the relation between the instrumental _ritornello_ and the material of the voice part in an aria. so far we have spoken only of the main body of the aria; but the addition of a middle section with a _da capo_, which constitutes the universal 18th-century _da capo_ form of aria, adds a very simple new principle to the essential scheme without really modifying it. a typical aria of the scarlatti or handelian type is a very large melody in binary form, delivered by the voice, which expands it with florid perorations before each cadence (and sometimes also with florid preludes); while relief is given to the voice, further spaciousness to the form, and justice done to the accompaniment, by the addition of an instrumental ritornello containing the gist of the melody not only at the beginning and end, but also in suitable shorter forms at the principal intermediate cadences in foreign keys. a smaller scheme of the same kind in a new group of related keys, but generally without much new material, is then appended as a middle section after which follows the main section _da capo_. the result is generally a piece of music of considerable length, in a form which cannot fail to be effective and coherent; and there is little cause for wonder in the extent to which it dominated 18th-century music. it was not, however, invariable. in the _cavatina_ we find a form too small for the _da capo_; and in the oratorios of handel and the choral works of bach we find a majority of arias in a larger form which evades the possibility of exact repetition. the aria forms are profoundly influenced by the difference between the sonata style and the style of bach and handel. but the scale of the form is inevitably small, and in any opera an aria is hardly possible except in a situation which is a tableau rather than an action. consequently there is no such difference between the form of the classical operatic aria of mozart and that of the handelian type as there is between sonata music and suite music. the scale, however, has become too large for the _da capo_, which was in any case too rigid to survive in music designed to intensify a dramatic situation instead of to distract attention from it. the necessary change of style was so successfully achieved that, until wagner succeeded in devising music that moved absolutely _pari passu_ with his drama, the aria remained as the central formal principle in dramatic music; and few things in artistic evolution are more interesting than the extent to which mozart's predecessor, the great dramatic reformer gluck, profited by the essential resources of his pet aversion, the aria style, when he had not only purged it of what had become the stereotyped ideas of ritornellos and vocal flourishes, but animated it by the new sense of dramatic climax to which the sonata style appealed. in modern opera the aria is almost always out of place, and the forms in which definite melodies nowadays appear are rather those of the song in its limited sense as that of a poem in formal stanzas all set to the same music. in other words, a song in a modern opera tends to be something which would be sung even if the drama had to be performed as a play without music; whereas a classical aria would in non-musical drama be a soliloquy. this can be shown by works at such opposite poles of musical and dramatic technique as bizet's _carmen_ and the later works of wagner. in _carmen_ the librettist has so managed that, if his work were performed as a play, almost the whole of it would have to be sung; and the one exception of musical importance is the developed soliloquy of micaela in the third act, which, although treated in no old-fashioned or commonplace spirit by the composer, is the one thing in the opera which sounds "operatic." in the later works of wagner those passages in which we can successfully detach complete melodies from their context have, one and all, dramatically the aspect of songs and not of soliloquies. siegmund sings the song of spring to his sister-bride; mime teaches siegfried lessons of gratitude in nursery rhymes; and the whole story of the _meistersinger_ is a series of opportunities for song-singing. the distinctions and gradations between aria and song are of great aesthetic importance, but their history would carry us too far. the distinction is obviously of the same importance as that between dramatic and lyric poetry. beethoven's _adelaide_ is a famous example of what is called a song when it is really entirely in aria style; while the operas of mozart and weber naturally contain in appropriate situations many numbers which really are songs. the composers themselves generally give appropriate names. thus mozart, in _figaro_, calls "non so piu cosa son" an aria, because of its free style, though cherubino actually sings it as a song he has just invented; while "voi che sapete," being more purely lyric, is called _canzona_. the term _aria form_ is applied, generally most inaccurately, to all kinds of slow cantabile instrumental music of which the general design can be traced to the operatic aria. mozart, for example, is very fond of slow movements in large binary form without development, and this is constantly called aria-form, though the term ought certainly to be restricted to such examples as have some traits of the aria style, such as the first slow movement in the great serenade in b flat. at all events, until writers on music have agreed to give the term some more accurate use, it is as well to avoid it and its cognate version, _lied-form_, altogether in speaking of instrumental music. the _air_ or _aria_ in a suite is a short binary movement in a flowing rhythm in common or duple time and by no means of the broadly tunelike quality which its name would seem to imply. (d. f. t.) ariadne (in greek mythology), was the daughter of minos, king of crete, and pasiphae, the daughter of helios the sun-god. when theseus landed on the island to slay the minotaur (q.v.), ariadne fell in love with him, and gave him a clue of thread to guide him through the mazes of the labyrinth. after he had slain the monster, theseus carried her off, but, according to homer (_odyssey_, xi. 322) she was slain by artemis at the request of dionysus in the island of dia near cnossus, before she could reach athens with theseus. in the later legend, she was abandoned, while asleep on the island of naxos, by theseus, who had fallen a victim to the charms of aegle (plutarch, _theseus_, 20; diodorus, iv. 60, 61). her abandonment and awakening are celebrated in the beautiful _epithalamium_ of catullus. on naxos she is discovered by dionysus on his return from india, who is enchanted with her beauty, and marries her when she awakes. she receives a crown as a bridal gift, which is placed amongst the stars, while she herself is honoured as a goddess (ovid, _metam._ viii. 152, _fasti_, iii. 459). the name probably means "very holy" = [greek: ari-agne]; another (cretan) form [greek: aridela] (= [greek: phanera])indicates the return to a "bright" season of nature. ariadne is the personification of spring. in keeping with this, her festivals at naxos present a double character; the one, full of mourning and sadness, represents her death or abandonment by theseus, the other, full of joy and revelry, celebrates her awakening from sleep and marriage with dionysus. thus nature sleeps and dies during winter, to awake in springtime to a life of renewed luxuriance. with this may be compared the festivals of adonis and osiris and the myth of persephone. theseus himself was said to have founded a festival at athens in honour of ariadne and dionysus after his return from crete. the story of dionysus and ariadne was a favourite subject for reliefs and wall-paintings. most commonly ariadne is represented asleep on the shore at naxos, while dionysus, attended by satyrs and bacchanals, gazes admiringly upon her; sometimes they are seated side by side under a spreading vine. the scene where she is holding the clue to theseus occurs on a very early vase in the british museum. there is a statue of the sleeping ariadne in the vatican museum. kanter, _de ariadne_ (1879); pallat, _de fabula ariadnea_ (1891).