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The Modes of Ancient Greek Music

THE END

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Note on the Seikilos Inscription (pp. 89-91, 133).

Since the publication of this work, the Seikilos inscription has been examined afresh by Mr. J. A. R. Munro (of Lincoln College, Oxford). The result of his examination is to show that the last note of the melody has been misread. From a squeeze which he has kindly placed at my disposal it appears that the word apaitei is written—

Sympols
Sympols

The line drawn under the three notes has caused the last to be read as , which has no meaning here. In fact it is a reversed Gamma (g apestrammenon), and answers to our e natural.

triad10
triad10
reversegamma
reversegamma

Hence the last line of the transcription on pp. 89-90 should be as follows:

to te-los ho chro-nos a-pai—tei [Listen]

Music Score
Music Score

The importance of this correction is obvious. The scale employed is now seen to be the octave—

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