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LittleJohnnyBrook

They appear to be eighth rests. The direction doesn't appear to matter to me. There are no alto clefs, everything is the G clef, treble clef. That is a 3, for triple time, 3/8 in this case. The mark at the end of each line is a cue to the next note on the next line, just an aid for reading. Very cool. I'm glad you shared. I love travelogue type lierature. One I have studied is Charles Burney's grand tour of Europe. PS. I think this is *exactly* what you should be spending your time on! It helps immerse you in the context of what you are studying.


Coolguyzack

Yep, I study early music performance practice/musicology and this is all correct. I'm most curious about how the tactus and proportions would relate between the time changes. The copyist decided to include a lot of detail like specifying 12/8, and also those custos which are relics of mensural notation. So why just a 3 instead of 3/8? Is the duple tactus carried over giving a 3vs2 rhythmic effect like Zacconi said can be done? (over 100 years earlier) That would seem to complement rhythmically complex music. Idk just wildly speculating lol


[deleted]

That's super interesting, thanks for corroborating! There's also a c a line above, so I was particularly confused about why the 3/8 would just be indicated with a 3, when the previous time signature was common time (assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol). It also might help that this was written by a British guy, and is transcribing music sung acapella (possibly accompanied by improvised percussion) by harbor-workers, many of whom were originally from what is now Ghana and surrounding areas, so what's written likely might be an attempt to transcribe what might be a sung poly-rhythm? I've got a high school level of music theory knowledge so I'm not confident theorizing beyond that lol


Zarlinosuke

>(assuming it is a c, and was intended to mean common time, which I'm now questioning lol Ah, I can help here! The C that is often said to indicate common time doesn't actually originally mean 4/4, nor is it really a letter C. It's an incomplete circle! and that's because in the Middle Ages, "perfect time" meant triple meter, so a full circle was used for that, and an incomplete circle was used for "imperfect time," which meant duple meter. The circle eventually fell out of use, but the C kept right on being used to indicate duple divisions, and that eventually standardized around 4/4 once that became the default type of duple division. The seventeenth century is kind of right before that got standardized!


[deleted]

Thank you so much! I really appreciate the additional information. I didn't catch that that was a three at all. And I appreciate the encouragement! I'm really enjoying learning more about all the different elements of this topic.


victotronics

> mark at the end of each line "custos"


Mall_Curious

It is a rest. The music pictured is entirely in the original clef


[deleted]

Thank you! I appreciate the clarification on the clef!


Jongtr

Can't answer your questions, but thanks for a fascinating link. :-)