Son et mouvement dans le compendium musicae de Descartes

Sound and movement in Descartes’ compendium musicae

Abstract

This paper seeks to characterize the concept of motion in Descartes’ Compendium Musicae. In this youth text, written before the elaboration of Descartes’ physics, that concept plays a central role, especially a) in understanding the nature of sound and b) in the remarks on musical time. By analyzing these two domains, we argue, first, that Descartes was in agreement with the ideas that gave rise to modern acoustics; second, we show that the concept of motion present in the Compendium anticipates some of the fundamental features that will constitute, a few years later, Descartes’ natural philosophy.

Keywords. Descartes. Motion. Sound. Music. Acoustics.