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  1. diesis love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. See double dagger.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. In Greek music, the Pythagorean semitone, being the difference between a fourth and two major tones, represented by the ratio 256: 243. Also used of two theoretical subdivisions of a major tone, amounting respectively to about a third or a fourth of a tone, called the chromatic and the enharmonic diesis.
  2. n. In modern music, the difference between an octave and three major thirds, represented by the ratio 128: 125. Also called the modern enharmonic diesis.
  3. n. In printing, the mark ‡, commonly called double dagger. See dagger.

Wiktionary

  1. n. music Any of several intervals, smaller than a tone, in ancient Greek music
  2. n. The double dagger sign -

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. (Mus.) A small interval, less than any in actual practice, but used in the mathematical calculation of intervals.
  2. n. (Print.) The mark ‡; -- called also double dagger. It is used in printing to indicate a cross reference or footnote.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a character used in printing to indicate a cross reference or footnote

Etymologies

  1. Medieval Latin, semitone (which was indicated by a double dagger), from Latin, quarter tone, from Greek diesis, a letting through, from diīenai, to send through : dia-, dia- + hīenai, to send; see yē- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

  • “He found striking analogies between a hit in quarte or tierce with the intervals of music which bear those names: when he made a feint, he cried out, "Take care of this diesis," because anciently they called the diesis a feint: and when he had made the foil fly from my hand, he would add, with a sneer, that this was a pause: in a word, I never in my life saw a more insupportable pedant.”

    The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  • “A diesis is a quarter tone; hence in a semitone there are included two dieses.”

    The Ten Books on Architecture

  • “La musica è del mio amato Chopin: Fantaisie Impromptu in do diesis minore, o.p.”

    No Fat Clips!!! : None of Us are Free: Burma

  • “For we come into the world with no natural notion of a right-angled triangle, or of a diesis, or of a half tone; but we learn each of these things by a certain transmission according to art; and for this reason those who do not know them, do not think that they know them.”

    The Discourses of Epictetus

  • “They still went to see Otello at the Theatre-Italien, but that was to hear Tamberlick's C diesis.”

    Musical Memories

  • “_Otello_ at the Théâtre-Italien, but that was to hear Tamberlick's C diesis.”

    Musical Memories

  • “He found striking analogies between a hit in 'quarte' or 'tierce' with the intervals of music which bears those names: when he made a feint he cried out, "take care of this 'diesis'," because anciently they called the 'diesis' a feint: and when he had made the foil fly from my hand, he would add, with a sneer, that this was a pause: in a word, I never in my life saw a more insupportable pedant.”

    The Confessions of J J Rousseau

  • “_diesis_, a term used to indicate the raising of the voice in the chromatic scale.”

    Critical and Historical Essays Lectures delivered at Columbia University

  • “tierce' with the intervals of music which bears those names: when he made a feint he cried out, "take care of this 'diesis'," because anciently they called the 'diesis' a feint: and when he had made the foil fly from my hand, he would add, with a sneer, that this was a pause: in a word, I never in my life saw a more insupportable pedant.”

    The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau — Complete

Lists

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Comments

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  • ruzuzu From the examples:

    “He found striking analogies between a hit in quarte or tierce with the intervals of music which bear those names: when he made a feint, he cried out, "Take care of this diesis," because anciently they called the diesis a feint: and when he had made the foil fly from my hand, he would add, with a sneer, that this was a pause: in a word, I never in my life saw a more insupportable pedant.”

    The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau
    Jan 14, 2013

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‘diesis’ has been looked up 856 times, added to 7 lists, commented on 1 time, and has a Scrabble score of 7.