Ear Trumpet

From Dead Media Archive
Revision as of 12:35, 5 December 2007 by 128.122.253.212 (Talk) (Speaking Trumpet)

Jump to: navigation, search

Speaking Trumpet

Elizabeth Bennion aptly declares the following to open her book Antique Hearing Devices,
“There are three points to be effected in order to aid inadequacy in hearing. Firstly, the distance between speaker and hearer can be reduced. Secondly, the speaker can increase the sound, either by speaking more loudly or by using some mechanical means such a s a megaphone or microphone. Thirdly, an artificial means can be found to collect more of the sound energy and direct it more efficiently into the auditory canal, or to introduce the vibrations of sound directly into the skull(Bennion 1).”
The first of the methods Bennion introduces to deal with audio inadequacy requires no medium to implement and in fact cannot entertain the use of a medium. The second is the first of her method which would merit an invention in the scheme of human development. The first textual record of a such a device appears in Homer's The Iliad around 850 B.C.which describes a large bronze trumpet designed to amplify the voice. Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C.) was also known to use a speaking horn mounted on a tripod to gather his huntsmen when they were at a great distance.(Berger 12)

The third method describes a heightening of the sound on the receivers end. So why is it that speaking trumpets were used widely and constructed with such high suffistication hundreds of years before the birth of christ, but ear trumpets would not be popularized and widely manufactured until the 16th century?

Telescoping Ear Trumpet

Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination
Telescoping or Collapsible Ear Trumpet (Curtis 184)
Error creating thumbnail: Unable to save thumbnail to destination
Slide Trumpet; Early 15th Century

The popularity of the Townsend Telescoping Ear trumpet can be attributed to the fact that it was compact, and easy to conceal. Interestingly, as far back as the early 15th century there is record of a slide trumpet, which uses the same basic principle (pictured right.) Needless to say this is an example of the obvious, using the existing ear trumpet technology with telescoping technology to increase compactness and further conceal disability.


Speaking Tubes

encoder / decoder

Works Cited

  • Bennion, Elisabeth. Antique Hearing Devices. London: Vernier Press, 1994.
  • Berger, Kenneth Walter. The Hearing Aid: Its Operation and Development. Detroit: National Hearing Aid Society, 1970.
  • Curtis, John Harrison. A Treatise on the physiology and pathology of the ear : containing a comparative view of its structure, functions, and various diseases; observations on the derangement of the ganglionic plexus of nerves, as the cause of many obscure diseases of the ear. Together with remarks on the deaf and dumb. 6th ed. London : Longman, 1836.
  • Kircher, Athanasius. Phonurgia Nova. 1673.
  • Porta, Giambattista della. Magia Naturalis. 1558.
  • Stephens, S. D. G., and J. C. Goodwin. "Non-Electric Aids to Hearing: a Short History." International Journal of Audiology 23 (1984): 215-240. InformaWorld. New York University Bobst. 1 Dec. 2007
  • Zielinski, Siegfried. Deep Time of Media. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2006.