DICTIONARY OF MUSIC - El Atril

458 HYPEK- HYPO-
HYPER- (Gr. hwip, 'over,' 'above'; Lat.
super). A prefix, extensively used in the terminology
of ancient tireek music—wherein it appears
in tile names of the five Acute Modes—and thence
transferred to the musical system of the Middle
Ages. The nomenclature of the one system must,
however, be very carefully distinguished from that
of the other ; for, though the same terms are, in
many cases, common to both, they are used to
designate very ditt'erent things. For instance,
the discarded Locrian Mode (B, G, D, E, F, G,
A, B) is often called the Hyper-ffiolian, in recognition
of the fact that its range lies a tone above
that of the true jEolian ; but this Mode has no
connection whatever with the Hyper-^olian of
the Greeks ; neither have the Authentic Modes,
as we now use them, the slightest affinity with
the Greek acute forms, though the prefix 'hyper *
has sometimes oeen very unnecessarily added to
the names of all of them. [See Modes.]
Greek authors constantly use the prepositions
VTr4p and virh in what we should now consider an
inverted sense ; applying the former to grave
sounds, and the latter to acute ones. This apparent
contradiction vanishes when we remember
that they are speaking, not of the gravity or
acuteness of the sounds, but of the position
on the lyre of the strings designed to produce
them. w. .s. ii.
HYPO- (Gr. virb, ' under,' ' below' ; Lat. sul).
A prefix applied, in ancient Greek music, to the
names of the five Grave Modes. In the Middle
Ages it was added to the names of the seven
Plagal Modes— the Hypo-dorian, the Hypophrygian,
the Hypo-lydian, the Hypo-mixolydian,
the Hypo-seolian, the discarded Hypo-
loorian, and the Hypo-ionian — the range of
which lies a fourth below that of their Authentic
originals. [See Mode.s.]
Early writers also add this prefix to the names
of certain intervals, when reckoned downwards,
instead of upwards ;
as Hypo-diatessaron ( = Subdiatessaron),
a fourth below ; Hypo-diapente
( = Subdiapente), a fifth below. [See Intek-
VAL.] w. s. K.