Χρῶμα
color, musical modulation, chromatic scale
Translated by Marcelo Boeri8 Nov 2002Vetting: high7 revisions
Translation
This means what exists in bodies, such as 'white', 'black', and the intermediates to these. It also means what exists in tunes, for in music there is something that is named 'color' or 'chromatic scale' as well. They maintain, in effect, that the three tunes of singing are harmonic, which they peculiarly call 'chromatic scales', the one of the soft or effeminate chromatic scale, and the one of the diatonic scale. They are different: some correspond to the color existing in bodies, such as what is dispersing and compressing the eye; others correspond to what exists in tunes. [The term] 'color' [in the sense of] 'chromatic scale' is homonymous, for [it means] what consists of a semitone, what consists of quarter-tones and what is soft or effeminate.1
Diodorus [writes]: 'while being flogged, the barbarian endured with his unmoved sight and his color like a beast.'2
Diodorus [writes]: 'while being flogged, the barbarian endured with his unmoved sight and his color like a beast.'2