character as a normal type; and indeed it was frequently so divided, in the 16th century, in the works of the great Madrigal writers. We may therefore say that, of all the notes now in use, the Semibreve is the one which unites us most closely to the system of those who invented the gerin of the method we ourselves follow; and it furnishes the safest guide we know of to the right understanding of their works.
SEMICHORUS, i.e. Half chorus; a word used to denote a kind of antiphonal effect produced by employing half the number of voices at certain points, and contrasting this smaller body of sound with the full chorus.
SEMICROMA (Lat. Semichroma; Eng. Quaver, or Semiquaver). The Italian name for the Semiquaver. Old writers, however, sometimes apply the term Croma to the Crotchet, and Semicroma to the Quaver; and, so vague was once the distinction between the two, that even Baretti, writing as late as 1824, makes the word 'Croma' signify 'a Crotchet or Quaver.' The etymology of the word Chroma is derived from the very early custom of using red notes intermixed with black ones. The red notes being sung more quickly than the black ones, the duration of a red Minim was a little longer than that of a black Semiminim (or Crotchet); and the note was called Chroma on account of its colour. [See Semiquaver, Semifusa, Semiminima, Quaver, Notation.]
SEMIFUSA. The Latin name for the Semiquaver; but sometimes applied to the Quaver also. The etymology of the term is not very clear. The most probable theory is that which traces it to a fancied resemblance between the early form of the Quaver, and that of a spindle (fusus). [See Semicroma, Semiquaver, Semiminima, Quaver, Notation.]
SEMIMINIMA Major and Minor (Eng. Greater, and Lesser Half-Minim = Crotchet, and Quaver; Ital. Croma e Semicroma; Germ. Viertel und Achtel; French Noire et Croche). Though the Minim was so called, because, at the time of its invention, it was the smallest (i.e. the shortest) of all notes, Composers soon found it convenient to divide it in half, and even into four parts. Franchinus Gafurius, quoting from Prosdocimus de Beldemandis, describes and figures these divisions in his 'Practica Musicæ,' printed in 1496. The Greater Semiminima, the equivalent of the modern Crotchet, was a black lozenge-headed note, with a tail, 
; the Lesser Semiminima, now called the Quaver, was a similar note, with a single hook, 
. Sometimes the head of the greater Semiminim was 'void'—that is to say, open, or white—in which case, this note also had a hook, to distinguish it from the Minim, 
; and, when this hooked form was used, the figure which we have described above as proper to the Greater Semiminim, was used for the Lesser one. When black and red notes were used together, the red Minim served as the diminutive of the black one; and the Semiminim was called Chroma, on account of its colour. This name was afterwards applied both to the Greater and the Lesser Semiminim; and hence it came to pass that, in later times, the term Chroma was applied indiscriminately to the Crotchet and the Quaver. [See Semichroma, Notation.]
SEMIQUAVER (Lat. Semifusa; Ital. Semicroma, Biscroma, Semifusa; Germ. Sechzehntel, Sechzehntheil-Note; Fr. Double croche). The sixteenth part of a Semibreve.
The earliest mention of the Semiquaver occurs in the 'Practica Musicæ' of Franchinus Gafurius, printed at Milan in 1496. It may be found—though very rarely—in the printed Polyphonic Music of the 16th century, in the form of a black lozenge-headed note, with a double hook, 
or ; and it is manifestly from this early type that our present figure is derived. In the 16th century both Semiquavers and Quavers were always printed with separate hooks. The custom of joining Quavers together by a single line, and Semiquavers by a double one, dates from the 17th century; and the credit of the invention is generally accorded to John Playford. Hawkins gives the year 1660 as 'about' the date of Playford's improvement; and tells us that the new method was first copied by the Dutch, then by the French, and afterwards by the Germans; but quotes the folio edition of Marcello's Psalms (Venice, 1724) as a proof that the Italians adhered to the old plan until late in the 18th century—as did also the Spaniards.[1] Long before that time, the custom of grouping Semiquavers after the modern manner was in constant use in England (except—as now—in cases in which a separate syllable was sung to each note), as may be seen in the early printed editions of Purcell's 'Te Deum,' and other similar works, in which may also be noticed the substitution of the roundhead for the earlier lozenge. [See Semicroma, Semifusa, Semiminima, Quaver, Notation.]
SEMITONE (from the Greek ἡμιτόνιον). Half a tone; the smallest interval in the ordinary musical scales. The semitone may be of different kinds, each of which has a different theoretical magnitude.
Since the invention of the diatonic scale the natural interval of the fourth has been subdivided artificially into two tones and a semitone. In the ancient Greek time the two tones were both what are now called major tones, and the hemitone had a magnitude determined by the difference between their sum and the fourth: but when harmony began to prevail, one of the tones was diminished to a minor tone, and this gave the modern semitone a little greater value. The semitone, so formed, as belonging to the diatonic scale (from B to C, or from E to F for example) is called a diatonic semitone.
The introduction of chromatic notes gave rise to a third kind of semitone, as from C to C♯ or
- ↑ Hawkins Hist. vol. iv. bk. iii. ch. 5. note.
