Temperament naming: Difference between revisions

: Meaning: "Augmented" gets its name from its 1/3-octave period, corresponding to an augmented triad.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_34327#34708 Yahoo! Tuning Groups | ''new equal temperament 5-limit error lattices''] - "i think carl and i just came to the consensus here that … the [temperament] you're calling 'diesic' should be called 'augmented'. besides the reasons already given … the period of the 'augmented' linear temperament is 1/3 octave (thus outlining an augmented triad)." —Paul Erlich</ref>

: Meaning: Keenan Pepper suggested it was a good name of a weird spiral-shaped animal, for a temperament in the porcupine family (like nautilus)

: A-Team is a pun on "eighteen", since the 2.9.21 subgroup of A-Team is nearly optimal in 18edo.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_18559.html#18563 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''1029'']</ref>

: Originally tripletone, in analogy with twintone, but when twintone was renamed pajara Paul Erlich suggested it should be augene, after augmented and Gene Smith.

: Meaning: The "cata" prefix means "down", and the catakleismic generator is very slightly down from the hanson generator, a temperament called "kleismic" until Paul Erlich decided the name must and shall be changed.

: Meaning: 3/2 is divided into 2 equal parts, hence "di-". Not sure why "-cot". "-Cot" has been suggested to originate from "cotyledon", the name for the embryo of a plant seed.

: Meaning: "Diminished" gets its name from its 1/4-octave period, corresponding to a diminished seventh chord.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_34327#34708 Yahoo! Tuning Groups | ''new equal temperament 5-limit error lattices''] - "i think carl and i just came to the consensus here that this should be called 'diminished', and the one you're calling 'diesic' should be called 'augmented'. besides the reasons already given, the period of the 'diminished' linear temperament is 1/4 octave (thus outlining a diminished seventh chord)" —Paul Erlich</ref>

: This naming was not immediate, however. Paul initially proposed the name "octo-diminished"<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_1997#1998 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''The four before meantone'']</ref>, which appears to be a reference to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mode_of_limited_transposition#Messiaen's_list Olivier Messiaen's 2nd mode of limited transposition, which is also known as the octatonic or ''diminished'' scale]; this scale also divides the octave into four equal parts.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_2064#2068 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Kleismic & co'' - "Paul [Erlich] suggested 'Octo-diminished', since it can be done very well by the 64-et." —Gene Ward Smith]</ref> but soon switched to sometimes using "diminished"<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_2009#2027 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Meantone & co'']</ref> and sometimes "octatonic", the latter of which was adopted by Joseph Monzo.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_3433#3464 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''some output from Graham's cgi''] - "I think [Joseph] Monz[o] and Paul [Erlich] have been calling it octatonic." —Carl Lumma</ref> Meanwhile, Gene proposed "igor" as a reference to Igor Stravinksy's association with this scale,<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_3433#3455  Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''some output from Graham's cgi''] - "It's a Paul [Erlich] favorite, since it is associated to the octatonic scale of jazz and Stravinsky. We could call it igor, I suppose." —Gene Ward Smith</ref> but this did not catch on. Eventually "octatonic" was rejected for being too generic,<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_35256#35262 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Octatonic temperament''] - "I'm not sure 'octatonic' is a good name for the temperament. There must be other temperaments whose basic scale has 8 notes. Isn't this what folks are calling the 'diminished' temperament on tuning-math?" —Dave Keenan</ref> while "diminished" was held to convey the 1/4-octave structure of the temperament better,<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_35256#35264 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Octatonic temperament''] - "I guess I need a name for this system that doesn't imply there's ''only'' eight notes in the tuning. And 'diminished' does suggest the 1/4-octave framework of the scale, so it's a better name than 'octatonic'." —Herman Miller</ref> and so "diminished" came to predominate.  

: As for "dimipent", when Paul released his Middle Path paper, he introduced a naming pattern whereby certain<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_97783.html#98172 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''A short recording of a semi-improvized 3D comma pump'' - "The 'sept'/'pent' distinction was according to a rule I never agreed with. I think it was that the TOP tunings had to be the same for the name to be the same. Gene [Ward Smith] ignores it. I don't care much either way for established names, but I may have to keep "Sensisept" because it exists in a higher limit. I can see the rule makes some sense if we're talking about temperaments, as I understand them. The existence of the rule may indicate Paul [Erlich] was understanding temperaments [sic] a similar way. But as I understand temperament classes (which is similar to how others understand regular temperaments) the tuning is allowed to vary over a wide range. There are subjective rules I follow when I share names over different limits and we can talk about individual cases if you like. I don't have a fixed definition, or deterministic algorithm, for deciding if two things in different limits are the same, and I don't want one." —Graham Breed]</ref> 7-limit extensions to 5-limit temperaments were required to have the same name, except for being suffixed with the numeric prefix "-sept" instead of the numeric prefix "-pent". This applied to three pairs of temperaments:

:* "diminished", which became "dimipent" and "dimisept",

:* "sensi", which became "sensipent" and "sensisept", and

:* "negri", which became "negripent" and "negrisept".

: This naming system was unpopular,<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_10620#10640 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Gene's mail server''] - "Anyway, since these names are so ugly, does ''anyone'' have suggestions for renaming them (Dimipent, Dimisept, Negripent, Negrisept, Sensipent, Sensisept) that preserves their approximate alphabetical location?" —Paul Erlich</ref><ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_12957 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''98 named 7-limit temperaments''] - Shows that there was some support for the -sept prefix from Gene Ward Smith still at this time.</ref> and did not catch on.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_104603#104603 Yahoo! Tuning Group | ''Subgroup temperament naming''] - "The thing we're doing now is analogous to Paul [Erlich]'s having different names for 'negripent' and 'negrisept' and such, which also didn't catch on." —Mike Battaglia</ref> In the case of negri, both negripent and negrisept fell out of use, and the modern convention of giving strong extensions the exact same name (distinguishing them as necessary with "septimal", etc.) was adopted instead, so both the 5-limit and 7-limit were called "negri". For diminished and sensi, however, these became the names for the 7-limit temperaments, while "dimipent" and "sensipent" stuck as names for the 5-limit temperaments. Because these originally 5-limit-specific names both also became the names for their entire temperament families, we can say that the "-pent" suffix in these two cases has lost its original (and indeed all) meaning.

: Confusingly, in [[Jean-Philippe Rameau]]'s [[Treatise on Harmony]] from 1722, he called [[2048/2025]] the "diminished comma", and so in a way "diminished temperament" should already have been considered taken; the modern name for 2048/2025, the diaschisma, which gives its name to the diaschismic temperament, comes from [[Hermann von Helmholtz]] much later, in 1875.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_62661#62683 Yahoo! Tuning Groups | ''Diaschisma article'']</ref> The interval [[648/625]], the modern "diminished comma" by virtue of it being the one diminished temperament makes vanish, has been called the "major diesis" or "greater diesis",<ref>[[Wikipedia: Diesis]]</ref> and so "major diesic" was also proposed as a name for this temperament.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning-math/topicId_2064#2067 Yahoo! Tuning Groups | ''Kleismic & co'']</ref> This would have gone along with [[128/125]] being the "(minor/lesser) diesis" and thus "minor diesic" temperament. Despite this not working out this way (due in part to too many things being named using "diesis"), in the end "diminished" and "augmented" still came out as an opposing pair.   

: Meaning: It's meantone which calls the dominant seventh chord a 4:5:6:7. It is one of the least complex 7-limit extensions of meantone.

: Meaning: Ennealimmal has a 1/9-octave period, hence "ennea-"; the period is very close to the large limma, [[27/25]], hence "limmal".

: Meaning: A combination of the words "fourth" and "third". This is meant to represent the unification of perfect fourths and major thirds in Father temperament.

: Meaning: Glacial sounds like "Igliashon".

: Named after its 40/27 "grave fifth" generator. See [[graviton]] for sources.

: Derived from a theory that you might be able to play the music of Harry Partch in it without driving him nuts so long as you didn't say that was what you were doing.

: Named after the fact that 26\57 is a possible generator, and the words "57 varieties" are found on the bottle labels of a popular brand of ketchup called "Heinz", so the connection is based on the presence of the number 57. It does not seem to be related in any way to [[Heinz Bohlen]].

: Keemun (simplified Chinese: <span style="font-family:SimSun">祁门红茶</span>; traditional Chinese: <span style="font-family:SimSun">祁門紅茶</span>; pinyin: qímén hóngchá; literally "Qimen red tea") is a black Chinese tea with a winey and fruity taste, designated as a China Famous Tea. It was given this name in Paul Erlich's Middle Path paper on the suggestion of Herman "Teamouse" Miller, thereby ending the unfortunate practice of calling this temperament, a 7-limit extension of hanson with a much lower accuracy, by the name "kleismic" also.

: Meaning: Graham named it "magic" by analogy with miracle; he was listening to the Fleetwood Mac song "You Make Loving Fun" that uses the word "miracle" at the time. Later he coined the backronym "multiple approximations generated iteratively and consistently" also by analogy with miracle.

: Meaning: Marvel was discovered while investigating slendric temperament, which at the time was called "wonder", and so "marvel" was introduced as an implicit variation on that name; along with miracle, then, there were now three temperaments with names conveying extraordinary goodness, so this began to constitute a temperament naming theme. See the temperament's dedicated page for sources.

: Double meaning: It is a miracle that this scale is so accurate! And it is an acronym "Multiple Integer Ratios Approximated Consistently, Linearly and Evenly."

: Meaning: 3/2 is divided into 8 equal parts, therefore "octa-".

: Origin: Originally (up to 2001) paultone and then twintone, in analogy with meantone, but Paul Erlich didn't like this and suggested pajara, after "Paul, John, and Ara," the three people jamming at his house at some random point in time.

: Meaning: Named after Herman Miller's Mizarian Porcupine Overture in 15edo.

: Has a kleismic generator, so that (6/5)⁶ = 3, and four periods per octave, therefore quadri-.

: Originally semisixths, but after it was decided that "bi" or "semi" should be half for periods and "hemi" should be half for generators, that was contracted to sensi.<ref>[https://yahootuninggroupsultimatebackup.github.io/tuning/topicId_97722.html#97733 ''Temperament names''] "The idea here is to use 'hemi' only when the generator is split in towo, not when the period is split in two." —Gene Ward Smith</ref>

: For more information on the origin of the "-pent" part of "sensipent", see [[#Dimipent|Dimipent]].

: The 126/125 planar temperament, named after Herman Miller's Starling scale. See the temperament's dedicated page for sources.  

: A name proposed by Paul Erlich because the 22-tone MOS looks a lot like the Indian Shruti scale.

: The 6/5 generator is ~322 cents, sharper than the kleismic 6/5, hence "super-". Can be restricted to 2.7.11 (orgone) or 2.5/3.7.11 (magicaltet).

: Meaning: Fifths are sharper than the just ratio of 3/2, hence "Superpythagorean".  

: Meaning: 3/2 is divided into 4 equal parts, hence "tetra-". Not sure why "-cot" (see Dicot above).