# The sound of a sow-gelder's horn

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-sound-of-a-sow-gelders-horn/551489>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 26, 2010, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-sound-of-a-sow-gelders-horn/551489 "2010-08-26T01:35:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2010, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-sound-of-a-sow-gelders-horn/551489/1 "2010-08-26T01:35:34Z")

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I’ve come across some references in English literature to a sow-gelder’s horn. Apparently there was such a profession (“geld” used to have a wider meaning than it does today, so “sow-spayer”), and they announced themselves with horns. I imagine the reaction was similar to when today’s children hear the tinny, distorted renditions of ice-cream van music. But what might it sound like? A trumpet, a tuba, a trombone? Any musical or theater history people know? (For reference, an article claims that “A sow-gelder actually appears on the stage in ’ Beggar’s Bush ‘, III, i, and jokes about the sow-gelder’s horn crop up in ‘The Picture’, ‘The Lover’s Melancholy’ and ’ Westward Ho’.”)

Bonus: I’m asking because I’m trying to identify a bird compared to its sound, either the [guillemot](http://sounds.bl.uk/View.aspx?item=022M-W1CDR0001389-3200V0.xml#) or the [red-throated diver / loon](http://sounds.bl.uk/View.aspx?item=022M-W1CDR0001524-0500V0.xml). Neither sounds particularly horn-like to me.