317 
M U 
having precluded the trouble of learning thefe clefs, ren¬ 
ders all the old editions of the bell authors of the laft cen¬ 
tury unintelligible; as it does all the rnufic in fcore writ¬ 
ten or printed abroad; all vocal rnufic from Italy, and 
harpfichord lefl'ons from Germany compoled 30 or 4.0 
years ago ; all the works of Seballian Bach, and the early 
productions of his foil Emanuel, for the harpfichord, of 
which the treble or right-hand part is in the foprano clef, 
or tenor on the firft line. Thefe, however excellent, are 
become totally obfolete and illegible to all but regularly - 
bred profeffors, in our country only. 
Example 3. exhibits the general fcale of notes, includ¬ 
ing the additional keys of a modern grand piano-forte. 
Ex. 4-. ihows the fcales in the different clefs, as ufed in 
vocal rnufic. 
Here every thing is exhibited in progreffion from low to 
high, or “ from grave to acute,” as we call it. But a very 
curious remark occurs in Dr. Gregory’s preface to his 
edition of Euclid: “As the ideas, of acute and high, 
grave and low, have in nature no neceffary connexion, it 
has happened accordingly,” fays Dr. G. “ that the more 
ancient of the Greek writers looked upon grave founds as 
high, and acute ones as low; and that this connexion was after¬ 
wards changed to the contrary, by the lefs ancient Greeks, 
and has lince prevailed univerfally. Probably this latter 
connexion took its rife from the formation of the voice 
in finging, which Ariftides Quinfililianus .thus defcribes : 
Tivslui n /J.IV @a.pv\r,<;, y.XTuQev xvaxpEpop^m 7 a ttrvsvy.xlo;, 
v) 67 ri 7 roA'<?? irponyevtt: Gravity takes place, if the 
breath is carried upwards from the lower part of the 
throat, but acutenefs if it rufhes forth from the higher 
part.” 
Characters and Values of the Notes and Hefts. 
The value of mufical notes is determined according to 
their degrees of length, or duration. A reft denotes a 
degree of filence equal in length to the duration of the 
note from which it is named. 
It does not appear from hiftory, that the Egyptians, 
Phcenicians, Hebrews, or any ancient people, who culti¬ 
vated the arts, except the Greeks and Romans, had mu¬ 
fical characters; and thefe had no other fymbols of found 
than the letters of their alphabet, which likewife ferved 
them for arithmetical numbers and chronological dates. 
As the notation of the Greeks was imagined in the in¬ 
fancy of the art of rnufic, when the flute had but few 
holes, and the lyre but few firings, the fimplicity of ex¬ 
prefling the ofilave of any found by the fame fign, as in 
modern rnufic, was not thought of; the molt ancient and 
conftant boundary of mufical tones having been the dia- 
tefferon, or fourth, the extremes of which interval were 
fixed, though the intermediate founds were mutable ; and 
in the manner of tuning thefe confided the difference of 
intervals in the feveral genera. 
The ancients ufed likewife four different monofyllables 
ending with different vowels, by way of folmfation, for 
the exercife of the voice in finging ; like our mi, fa, fol, la. 
Thefe were, for the firft note of each tetrachord, ra, for 
thefecond rij, for the third ra, and for the fourth, if it did 
not ferve as the firft of the adjoining and relative tetra¬ 
chord, te~ ; but, if it began a new tetrachord, it was called 
by the firft name, to. The repetition of thefe monofyl¬ 
lables is a further proof that the fourth in the ancient 
mulic ferved as a boundary to a fyftem of four founds, in 
the fame manner as a hexachord did in the Guido fcale, 
and as an ofilave does for eight founds in the more mo¬ 
dern prafilice. 
As the Greeks ufed all the four-and-twenty letters of 
their alphabet for mufical characters, of fymbols of found; 
and as their mod extenfive fyftem or fcale did not exceed 
two ofilaves, or fifteen founds, it fhould feem as if their 
Ample alphabet was more than fufiicient to exprefs them ; 
for, their mulic being at firft only a notation of their 
poetry, the rhythm, or air, mull have been determined 
by the metre of the verfes, without the afliltance of figns 
VOL. XVI. No. 1114. 
S I c. 
of proportion peculiar to rnufic. But, fuppofing it was 
neceffary for them to have different characters to exprefs 
the different feet of the verfe, it is certain that voCal rnufic 
was in no want of them; and inftrumental, being chiefly 
vocal rnufic played by inftruments, had likewife no need 
of them, when the words were written, or the player knew 
them by heart. However, in order to multiply thefe cha- 
lactei s, tlm letters of their alphabet were lometimes writ¬ 
ten in capitals, and lometimes fmall; fome were entire, 
fome mutilated, fome doubled, and fome lengthened; 
and, befides thefe diftinfitions in the form of the letters, 
tney had others of lituation, fometimes turning them to 
the right, fometimes to the left; fometimes inverting, 
and fometimes placing them horizontally ; for inftance, 
the letter gamma, by thefe expedients, ferved to exprefs 
feven different founds: r Lip 
Some of 
the letters were alfo barred, or accented, in order to 
change their lymbolical import; and, thefe ftill not fuf¬ 
ficing, they made the common grave and acute accents 
ferve as fpecific mufical notes. 
It is a matter that has been long difputed among the 
learned, whether accents were originally mufical characters, 
or marks of profocly. It is in vain to let about determin¬ 
ing a queftion concerning which the proofs on both fides 
are fo numerous. (See Gaily and Spelman againfl accents , 
and Primatt and Forffer in defence of them.) Mr. Weft- 
is firmly of opinion “that accents were originally mufical 
notes, let over words to direfit the feveral tones and in¬ 
flexions of the voice, requifite to give the whole fentence 
its proper harmony and cadence.” (Pind. vol. ii.) And 
the abbe du Bos, w'ho frequently by a peremptory decifion 
cuts the knot of fuch difficulties as he is unable to untie 
afferts, without fufiicient proof, that, as poets originally 
fet their own verfes, they placed for this purpofe a figure, 
or accent, over each fyllable. So that, according to this 
writer, we are at prefent not only in poffeflion of the 
poetry of Homer, Pindar, Anacreon, and Sappho, but their 
mafic. Why then do we complain of the total lofs of 
Greek rnufic ? But, as rnufic had charafilers different 
from accents fo early as the time of Terpander, to whom 
the invention is given by the Oxford Marbles, which 
place this event about fix hundred and feventy years be¬ 
fore Chrift ; and, as accents for profody are likewife proved 
to be of high antiquity, it feems as if there could have 
been no neceflity for the ancients to ufe one for the 
other. 
But it has already been remarked that the letters of the 
alphabet, though turned, diftorted, and mutilated, fo 
many different ways, were infuflicient to exprefs the 
founds of all the modes in the three genera; fo that re- 
courfe was had to accents, as the fcale became more ex¬ 
tended, in order to augment the number of charafilers. 
And Alypius, in the enumeration of the notes in the en¬ 
harmonic genus, tells us, that trite fynemmenon is repre- 
fented by beta and the acute accent; and parunete fynem¬ 
menon enarmonios by alpha and the grave accent. ~ This 
is a proof that the accents were known at the time of 
Alypius, and were then ufed chiefly for profody, not 
rnufic, for which thby were only called in occafionally. 
Indeed they are mentioned as accentual marks by writers 
of much higher antiquity than Alypius; for not only 
Cicero and Plutarch, but Ariftotle and Plato, fpeak of 
them as merely regarding the elevation and depreflion of 
the voice in fpeech. However, in the early Greek and 
Roman miffals, the mufical charafilers ufed in canto fer.no 
feem to have been only lengthened accents. 
Thefe various modifications of letters and accents in 
the Greek notation compofed in all one hundred and 
twenty different charafilers, which were ftill confiderably 
multiplied in prafilice ; for, each of thefe charafilers ferv- 
ing many purpofes in the vocal as well as inftrumental 
tablature or gammut, and being changed and varied ac¬ 
cording to the different modes and genera, as the names 
4- M of 
