Definition of "sambuca"

Cymbals, trumpets and organs (familiar Old Testament vocabulary) appear conventionally enough as cymballe, trwmpedau and organau, but the more obscure psaltria, trigona, and sambucae (psalteries, trigons and sambucae: three types of Greek harp) become psalteris, kornets, shalmes, [a] dulcimus in translation (Chapter Six, paragraph 7); cornets and shawns are, of course, wind instruments.

2007, Sally Harper, “Part III: Welsh Music in an English Milieu c.1550–1650”, “19. A Welsh Translation of John Case’s Apologia Musices”, in Music in Welsh Culture Before 1650: A Study of the Principal Sources, Routledge, published 2016, page 334

Marcellus had prepared, at great expense, machines called ſambucae, from their reſemblance to a muſical inſtrument of that name. […] “Shall we perſiſt,” ſaid he to his workmen and engineers, “in making war with this Briareus of a geometrician, who treats my gallies and ſambucae ſo rudely? He infinitely exceeds the fabled giants with their hundred hands, in his perpetual and ſurpriſing diſcharges upon us.”

1790, “Book Twenty-First. The History of Syracuse”, “Article II. The Reign of Hieronymus, the Troubles Consequential of It, and the Siege and Taking of Syracuse”, in The Ancient History, 8th edition, volume VIII, Edinburgh: Mundell and Son, translation of original by Charles Rollin, pages 92, 93

This machine was called a sambuca, from its resemblance to a musical instrument of that name, not unlike an harp. the consul’s design was to bring his sambuca to the foot of the walls of Acradina; but while it was at a considerable distance, (and it advanced very slowly, being moved only by two ranks of rowers,) Archimedes discharged from one of his engines a vast stone weighing, according to Plutarch, 1250 pounds, then a second, and immediately afterwards a third; all which, falling upon the sambuca with a dreadful noise, broke its supports, and gave the gallies upon which it stood such a violent shock that they parted, and the machine which Marcellus had raised upon them at a vast expense was battered to pieces.

1813, Richard Clarke, The Life of the Right Honorable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, London: J. and J. Cundee, page 118

After this there arose a discussion about the sambuca. And Masurius said that the sambuca was a musical instrument, very shrill, and that it was mentioned by Euphorion (who is also an Epic poet), in his book on the Isthmian Games; for he says that it was used by the Parthians and by the Troglodytæ, and that it had four strings. He said also that it was mentioned by Pythagoras, in his treatise on the Red Sea. The sambuca is also a name given to an engine used in sieges, the form and mechanism of which is explained by Biton, in his book addressed to Attalus on the subject of Military Engines. And Andreas of Panormus, in the thirty-third book of his History of Sicily, detailed city by city, says that it is borne against the walls of the enemy on two cranes. And it is called sambuca because when it is raised up it gives a sort of appearance of a ship and ladder joined together, and resembles the shape of the musical instrument of the same name. But Moschus, in the first book of his treatise on Mechanics, says that the sambuca is originally a Roman engine, and that Heraclides of Pontus was the original inventor of it.

1854, “Book XIV”, “Music”, in C. D. Yonge, transl., The Deipnosophists or Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, volume III, London: Henry G. Bohn, page 1012

Whenever the sambucae approached these beams were swung round on their axis, and by means of a rope running through a pulley dropped the stones on the sambuca, the consequence being that not only was the engine smashes, but the ship and those on board were in the utmost peril.

1966, W. R. Paton, transl., Polybius: The Histories, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, page 459

I’m not overly keen on the idea of setting to sea on ships with contraptions like the sambucae on board either, Crespo, but orders are orders. […] There were fewer projectiles coming down here, because the enemy artillerymen were concentrating on the Romans directly below their positions. Some way off to his right, the sambuca on the craft that had come in at the same time as theirs had just been grabbed by another iron claw.

2014, Ben Kane, Hannibal: Clouds of War, Arrow Books, pages 137, 163

The ram bows were of course useless against a seawall, so the actual assault was conducted using four sambucae (“harps”), each of which consisted of two quinqueremes lashed together side by side for stability, with a large scaling ladder mounted to the decks. These sambucae would only be able to attack where the rocky coast was deep enough to allow it to come right up to the seawall, so that they could lean their ladders against the wall, allowing Roman troops to assault by escalade. Surrounding the sambucae were the quinqueremes with archers and javelineers on deck, who would provide fire support against the defending Syracusians (Figure 4).

2017, Larrie D. Ferreiro, “Archimedes the Military Engineer”, in Chris Rorres, editor, Archimedes in the 21st Century: Proceedings of a World Conference at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Birkhäuser, “213 BCE: Archimedes and the Defense-in-Depth of Syracuse Against the Romans”, pages 24–25