One of the most striking features of the so-called Scientific Revolution of the late 16th and 17th centuries is the mathematization of physics, as embodied, for instance, in Galileo Galilei's famous claim that,the book of the Universe is written in mathematical language.. In two research fields however, music and astronomy, this claim was already an established part of the age-old Pythagorean-Platonic tradition. Why, after almost two thousand years, did the time-honoured idea of sounding number suddenly give rise to experiments and new theories in the realm of musical acoustics? it is probable that the study of ancient Greek music theory during the sixteenth century was one of the main factors in this process. Two key episodes in the history of early modern acoustics - the emergence of the coincidence theory of sound, and Vincenzo Galilei's musical experiments - can be shown to be directly dependent on texts by Nikomachos and the peripatetic tradition. For, even if they wanted to read the book of Nature, early modern science still had to study the books of the Ancients.
