ABSTRACT
Book III of Hugo Riemann’s 1898 History of Music Theory is discussed from the point of view of historical method and underlying motivation. Although he casts his history of harmonic theory as a developmental history, Riemann is shown to have constructed a discovery history, in which a set of unchanging natural truths about harmonic logic are gradually discovered by generations of theorists who are understood to be asking the same questions. Riemann’s methodology as a historian of theory is seen as embodying the same taxonomic impulse that informs his theoretical work. There follows an investigation of the claims of natural science, idealist thought, and nationalist pride on Riemann’s motivation for writing his history of harmonic theory.
