Pythagoras established the inverse relation between pitch and string length

Evidence

Scientific and engineering knowledge of communication processes has developed over the last hundreds, even thousands, of years. First there were beliefs that sounded rational, but a closer investigation found them to be false or only partially true. Some early thinkers and experimenters, such as Pythagoras, turned out to be very successful and influential (Hunt, 1992). Pythagoras studied the behavior of strings and understood the inverse relation between pitch and string length in ancient Greece during the sixth century B.C. — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 96

Scientific and engineering knowledge of communication processes has developed over the last hundreds, even thousands, of years. First there were beliefs that sounded rational, but a closer investigation found them to be false or only partially true. Some early thinkers and experimenters, such as Pythagoras, turned out to be very successful and influential (Hunt, 1992). Pythagoras studied the behavior of strings and understood the inverse relation between pitch and string length in ancient Greece during the sixth century B.C. Related to the harmony (consonance) of sounds, he assumed that the whole universe followed simple number rules of harmony. — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 96

Categorization

• CANDY: Pythagoras figuring out pitch vs string length in 600 BC is a fun dinner-party fact.
• XREF: Pythagorean harmony-as-universe-law connects to the reader’s knowledge of music theory and ancient Greek science history. — connects to: Pythagorean whole-number ratios led to the doctrine of the music of the spheres; String length ratios explain musical intervals since Pythagoras; Designing scales from upper harmonics yields ratios no Pythagorean scheme can reach (+2 more)
• corroborated: 4 independent passages support this claim — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 96

Broader Connections

• String pitch depends on mass per unit length, length, and tension #expands (0.85) — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 1069
• Pitch is controlled by string length, tension, or mass #expands (0.82)