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Music & vocals by Farya Faraji, aulos recording by Stefanos Krasopoulis. Stefanos is an incredibly talented Greek musician and one of the few thousand, if not hundreds of people on the planet who has mastered the ancient Greco-Roman aulos. Please check out his awesome channel where he plays a variety of Greek instruments from Antiquity to the modern age and consider subscribing to him: @user-vv6fh1sk5f Please note that this is not reconstructed Ancient Roman music but a composition in the style of Ancient Roman music augmented with a few modern aspects, namely a moving drone that harmonises the main melody slightly. This piece of music puts to music the funerary inscription of Longinus Sdapeze, a Roman duplicarius who hailed from Thrace and served as duplicarius in a cavalry regiment of the Roman army stationed in Britain. The funerary inscription was found there, in the city of Colchester. The instrumentation consists of the Vergina model of the aulos, with a softer sound than the harsher Louvre model I utilised in my previous Roman and Greek songs, a pan flute, a Greco-Roman lyre, cymbals, frame drums, and an ancient Celtic carnyx. The melody is based in the modal system of Greco-Roman music, and switches between the Dorian and Phrygian diatonic modes of that system. The sung lyrics are in Restored Classical pronunciation, and adhere to the long vs short vowel distinction of the language as well as its resulting penultimate stress accent rule. Lyrics in Latin: Longinus Sdapeze Filius Matyci, Duplicarius ala prima Tracum, Annorum quadraginta, Aerorum quindecim, Hic situs est. English translation: Longinus Sdapeze son of Matucus, Duplicarius from the First Cavalry Regiment of Thracians, Aged 40, of 15 years’ service, Lies buried here.
