aulos

aulos

Auloi player with …

(credit: Courtesy of the trustees of the British Museum, London)

Single- or double-reed pipe usually played in pairs, particularly in ancient Greece. During the Classical period the pipes were of equal length, each with three or four finger holes. The principal wind instrument of most ancient Middle Eastern peoples, it existed in Europe up to the early Middle Ages, often as a single pipe with more finger holes. Its quavering sound, described by Plato, was classically associated with the rites of Dionysus.