1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Serpent
SERPENT (Lat. serpens, creeping, from serpere; cf. “reptile” from repere, Gr. ἕρπειν), a synonym for reptile or snake (see Reptile, and Snakes), now generally used only of dangerous varieties, or metaphorically. See also Serpent-Worship below.
In music the serpent (Fr. serpent, Ger. Serpent, Schlangenrohr,
Ital. serpentone) is an obsolete bass wind instrument derived from
the old wooden cornets (Zinken), and the progenitor of the
bass-horn, Russian bassoon and ophicleide. The serpent is
composed of two pieces of wood, hollowed out and cut to the
desired shape. They are so joined together by gluing as to form
a conical tube of wide calibre with a diameter varying from a
little over half an inch at the crook to nearly 4 in. at the wider end.
The tube is covered with leather to ensure solidity. The upper
extremity ends with a bent brass tube or crook, to which the
cup-shaped mouthpiece is attached; the lower end does not expand
to form a bell, a peculiarity the serpent shared with the cornets.
The tube is pierced laterally with six holes, the first three of
which are covered with the fingers of the right hand and the
others with those of the left. When all the holes are thus
closed the instrument will produce the following sounds, of
which the first is the fundamental and the rest the harmonic
series founded thereon: 
Each
of the holes on being successively opened gives the same
series of harmonics on a new fundamental, thus producing a
chromatic compass of three octaves by means of six holes only.
The holes are curiously disposed along the
tube for convenience in reaching them
with the fingers; in consequence they are
of very small diameter, and this affects the
intonation and timbre of the instrument
adversely. With the application of keys
to the serpent, which made it possible
to place the holes approximately in the
correct theoretical position, whereby the
diameter of the holes was also made
proportional to that of the tube, this defect
was remedied and the timbre improved.
The serpent was, according to Abbé Lebœuf,[1] the outcome of experiments made on the cornon, the bass cornet or Zinke, by Edmé Guillaume, canon of Auxerre, in 1590. The invention at once proved a success, and the new bass became a valuable addition to church concerted music, more especially in France, in spite of the serpent's harsh, unpleasant tone. Mersenne (1636) describes and figures the serpent of his day in detail, but it was evidently unknown to Praetorius (1618). During the 18th century the construction of the instrument underwent many improvements, the tendency being to make the unwieldy windings more compact. At the beginning of the 19th century the open holes had been discarded, and as many as fourteen or seventeen keys disposed conveniently along the tube. Gerber, in his Lexikon (1790), states that in 1780 a musician of Lille, named Régibo, making further experiments on the serpent, produced a bass horn, giving it the shape of the bassoon for greater portability; and Frichot, a French refugee in London, introduced a variant of brass which rapidly won favour under the name of “bass horn” or “basson russe” in English military bands. On being introduced on the continent of Europe, this instrument was received into general use and gave a fresh impetus to experiments with basses for military bands, which resulted first in the ophicleide (q.v.) and ultimately in the valuable invention of the piston or valve.
Further information as to the technique and construction of the serpent may be gained from Joseph Fröhlich's excellent treatise on all the instruments of the orchestra in his day (Bonn, 1811), where clear and accurate practical drawings of the instruments are given. (K. S.)
- ↑ See Mémoire concernant l'histoire ecclésiastique et civile d'Auxerre (Paris. 1848), ii. 189.