; that for the brevis or breve came from the punctum, written thus
. The new signs were long
and breve
. The semi-breve was a lozenge-shaped alteration of the breve,
. This seems simple enough until we come across the distressful circumstances that the same sign represented both the perfect and imperfect long, and that the perfect and imperfect breve, too, shared the same figure. The following table illustrates the early mensural notes and their equivalents in modern notation.
