Mikhail Mishaqa

Who is Mikhail Mishaqa?

Mikhail Mishaqa born in Rashmayyā, Lebanon is "the first historian of modern Ottoman Syria" as well as the "virtual founder of the twenty-four equal quarter tone scale".

Mikhail's great-grandfather, Jirjis Mishaqa I, converted to Greek Catholicism. Jirjis' father, Youssef Petraki, an ethnic Greek, moved from Corfu, Greece to Tripoli, Lebanon to pursue the silk trade and was Greek Orthodox. As such he named himself after an Arabic term describing the process of filtering silk fibers, mishaqa. Mikhail's father, Jirjis Mishaqa II, moved to Deir al-Qamar, then controlled by the Shihabs, to escape the religious repression of al-Jazzar, the governor of Sidon. He begun a career as a goldsmith but became a scribe and then chief treasurer for the Amir of Mount Lebanon, Bashir II's household.

According to Touma Mishaqa was the first theorist to propose a division of the octave into roughly twenty-four equal intervals, this being the current basis of the Arab tone system.