CHAPTER XV.
THE CHANGES IN MUSICAL NOTATION.
HE entire movement of musical thought since three or four tones began to be put together into scales, melodies and unities of various kinds, has been in the direction of classification. This is shown very conclusively in the history of musical notation, which, at the end of the period just now under consideration, had reached a form nearly the same as we now have it. The early notation regarded tones as individual, and wholly without classification of any kind. The first musical notation of which we have any authentic knowledge was that of the Greeks already noted in [chapter III]. Their scale consisted of two octaves and one note, their so-called "greater perfect system," and the tones were named by the first fifteen letters of the Greek alphabet. This, however, was only a beginning of their system, for the variety of pitches required in their enharmonic and chromatic scales, and in the various transposition scales was so great that they required sixty-seven characters for representing them. These characters were written above the words to which they applied, and they had additional marks for duration, especially in the later periods of Greek music. Besides this they had an entirely different set of characters for the same tones played upon the cithara, so that a word to be sung without accompaniment had one mark above it for the pitch of the note, while if accompanied even by the same tone upon the instrument, a second character was written for the instrumental part. The system was wholly without classification, except that the letters were applied from the lowest notes upward, the same as we now have them. There was nothing to assist the eye in forming an idea of the movement of the melody, and as the forms of the letters were very similar in some cases there is no doubt that mistakes of copyists were numerous. This, however, is a matter of little concern to us, since no authentic melodies of the classical period have come down to us. The example of Greek characters given on [p. 69], in connection with the Ode of Pindar, sufficiently illustrates the nature of this notation, although the interposition of the staff between the musical notes and the words deprives the illustration of a part of its value.
The Romans had also a notation consisting of letters written above the words to which they applied; they made use of the first fifteen letters of the alphabet in the same manner as the Greeks, but we do not know whether they employed the same characters for the instruments and the voices, or had different ones. The only example we possess of the Roman notation from classical times, or in close tradition from classical times, is that in "Boethius' Consolations of Philosophy." From the fact of this being the only place where the Roman notation is illustrated, certain writers have concluded that Boethius invented it—a supposition which is utterly improbable. Boethius mentions the Roman notation, and employs it, as also does Hucbald in certain of his examples, but neither one of them explains it or gives any account of its origin. We have simply to take it for granted that the Romans transferred the letter notation of approximate pitch to their own characters instead of using Greek letters. The following example from Guido's book illustrates the appearance of the Roman notation as he uses it:
Fig. 31.