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209Conclusions for the previous two case studiesA study of local polyphonic traditions suggests that the prevailing tendency of thehistorical dynamics is the disappearance of the vocal polyphonic traditions. Actually,this is not a prevailing, but the only tendency. Historically documented cases of thedisappearance of polyphonic traditions come from Europe, Asia, America, and Oceania.On the contrary, the documented cases of the appearance of vocal polyphonic traditions(as the natural evolution of polyphonic singing from monophony) are conspicuouslyabsent. This means that the universally accepted idea of the natural evolutionarytransformation of monophonic singing into polyphonic singing is a fiction, totallyunsupported by the evidence.I believe that the few cases of the disappearance of the vocal polyphonictraditions from different parts of the world that I mentioned in this “case study”, are infact only the “tip of the iceberg” of the multiple cases of the disappearance of polyphonictraditions in different regions of our planet. My colleagues, experts in traditional musicfrom different regions of the world might be aware of few more such cases ofdisappearance (or decline) of polyphonic tradition that I am not aware of. Hardly any ofmy colleagues would remember someone writing about the exciting news of the“beginnings of the new vocal polyphonic tradition” (I mean the evolutionary change frommonophony to polyphony), whereas scholarly literature is full of suggestions (founded orunfounded) of the “ancient survival” of the existing vocal polyphonic traditions and theirgradual disappearance.I am sure that in ten years we will know about many more such cases of thedisappearance of vocal polyphonic traditions in different parts of the world than I havewritten in this book. And still, I believe that we will never learn about most of the casesof the decline and disappearance of vocal polyphonic traditions during the centuries andmillennia of human history and prehistory.The idea of the disappearance of some polyphonic traditions is not new inethnomusicology. For example, here are the words of Albert Lloyd from the 1961 issueof the Journal of the International Folk Music Council. Discussing the polyphonictraditions in Albania, Lloyd comments: “Certainly, comparing these [Albanianpolyphonic] forms with those of Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and northern Greece, one has theimpression that Albania has developed part-singing to a far higher degree. Or should onesay: has preserved it better? For it is possible, even probable, that at one time variouspolyphonic forms abounded all over the southern Balkans and perhaps far beyond it, thathave since dwindled or disappeared. Albanian country communities are more isolated andculturally more conservative than those of Bulgaria, say. In Bulgaria, in Sofia, Pirin andwestern Rhodope regions, diaphony abounds, but more complex forms are hard to seek.Moreover, even the two-voice singing there is nowadays confined mainly to women andgirls, who are notoriously slower than men to change their cultural habits. The notion thatthe more elaborate forms are ison-based polyphony are now dwindling in the Balkansgains support from Nikolai Kaufman’s study of the songs of the Macedonian district ofKostur (Kastoria). Besides one- and two-voice songs, the Kostur tradition also has threevoicesongs: but this three-part polyphony is in process of disappearing, the informantsare all old, mostly women, and youngsters show little taste for this music though they still