Musical Symbols

Music notation or musical notation is any system used to visually represent aurally perceived sounds through the use of written symbols, including ancient or modern musical symbols. Types and methods of notation have varied between cultures and throughout history, and much information about ancient music notation is fragmentary.

Little is known about the ancient notation. We have evidence that Ancient Babylon used pictographs, Egypt — syllables. As for the oldest note manuscripts, they're made in Greek. Ancient Greek notation is represented in a separate Unicode block. In addition, here you can find Byzantine musical symbols.

Although many ancient cultures used symbols to represent melodies, none of them is nearly as comprehensive as written language. Comprehensive notation started to develop in Europe in the Middle Ages, and since then it has been adapted to many genres of music worldwide.

The music symbols were included in Unicode version 4.1 published in March 2005. Modern notation symbols are collected here. Some of them may be encountered in the block called Miscellaneous symbols.