Editing Diatonic scale (section)

==History==
Western music from the [[Medieval music|Middle Ages]] until the [[Romantic music|late 19th century]] (see [[common practice period]]) is based on the diatonic scale and the unique [[hierarchy|hierarchical]] relationships created by this system of organizing seven notes.

===Antiquity===
{{main|Music of Mesopotamia}}

Evidence that the [[Sumer]]ians and [[Babylonia]]ns used a version of the diatonic scale is found in [[cuneiform]] inscriptions that contain both musical compositions and a tuning system.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Kilmer |first=Anne Draffkorn |date=1998 |title=The Musical Instruments from Ur and Ancient Mesopotamian Music |url=http://www.penn.museum/sites/expedition/?p=5425 |journal=[[Expedition (magazine)|Expedition]] |volume=40 |issue=2 |pages=12–19 |access-date=2015-12-29}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Crickmore |first=Leon |title=ICONEA 2008: Proceedings of the International Conference of Near Eastern Archaeomusicology |publisher=Iconea Publications |year=2010 |editor-last1=Dumbrill |editor-first1=Richard |editor1-link=Richard Dumbrill (musicologist) |volume=24 |location=London |pages=11–22 |chapter=New Light on the Babylonian Tonal System |access-date=2015-12-29 |editor-last2=Finkel |editor-first2=Irving |editor2-link=Irving Finkel |chapter-url=http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/10599417/281241773/name/Crickmore-Iconea2008.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160113110832/http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/10599417/281241773/name/Crickmore-Iconea2008.pdf |archive-date=13 January 2016 |url-status=dead}}</ref> Despite the conjectural nature of reconstructions of the [[Hurrian songs]], the diatonic nature of the tuning system is demonstrated by the fact that it involves a series of six perfect fifths, which is a recipe for the construction of a diatonic scale.

The 9,000-year-old [[Gudi (instrument)|flutes]] found in [[Jiahu]], China, indicate the evolution over 1,200 years of flutes having 4, 5 and 6 holes to having 7 and 8 holes, the latter exhibiting striking similarity to diatonic hole spacings and sounds.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Zhang |first1=Juzhong |last2=Harbottle |first2=Garman |last3=Wang |first3=Changsui |last4=Kong |first4=Zhaochen |date=23 September 1999 |title=Oldest playable musical instruments found at Jiahu early Neolithic site in China |journal=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]]|volume=401 |issue=6751 |pages=366–368|doi=10.1038/43865 |pmid=16862110 |bibcode=1999Natur.401..366Z |s2cid=205033636 |doi-access=free }}</ref>

===Middle Ages===
The scales corresponding to the medieval [[church modes]] were diatonic. Depending on which of the seven notes of the diatonic scale you use as the beginning, the positions of the intervals fall at different distances from the starting tone (the "reference note"), producing seven different scales. One of these, the [[Locrian mode|one starting on B]], has no pure fifth above its reference note (B–F is a [[diminished fifth]]): it is probably for this reason that it was not used. Of the six remaining scales, two were described as corresponding to two others with a B{{music|b}} instead of a B{{music|natural}}:

# A–B–C–D–E–F–G–A was described as D–E–F–G–A–B{{music|b}}–C–D (the modern [[Aeolian mode]]s whose reference notes are A and D, respectively, corresponding to the [[Aeolian mode]]s of [[C major]] and [[F major]], respectively)
# C–D–E–F–G–A–B–C was described as F–G–A–B{{music|b}}–C–D–E–F (the modern [[Ionian mode]]s whose reference notes are C and F, respectively, corresponding to the [[Ionian mode]]s of [[C major]] and [[F major]], respectively).

As a result, medieval theory described the church modes as corresponding to four diatonic scales only (two of which had the variable B{{music|natural}}/{{music|b}}). They were the modern [[Dorian mode|Dorian]], [[Phrygian mode|Phrygian]], [[Lydian mode|Lydian]], and [[Mixolydian mode|Mixolydian]] modes of [[C major]], plus the [[Aeolian mode|Aeolian]] and [[Ionian mode|Ionian]] modes of [[F major]] when B{{music|b}} was substituted into the Dorian and Lydian modes of [[C major]], respectively.

===Renaissance===
[[Heinrich Glarean]] considered that the modal scales including a B{{music|b}} had to be the result of a transposition. In his ''[[Dodecachordon]]'', he not only described six "natural" diatonic scales (still neglecting the seventh one with a diminished fifth above the reference note), but also six "transposed" ones, each including a B{{music|b}}, resulting in the total of twelve scales that justified the title of his treatise. These were the 6 non-[[Locrian mode|Locrian]] [[Mode (music)#Modern modes|modes]] of [[C major]] and [[F major]].

===Modern===
By the beginning of the [[Baroque music|Baroque]] period, the notion of the musical [[key (music)|key]] was established, describing additional possible transpositions of the diatonic scale. [[Major scale|Major]] and [[minor scale]]s came to dominate until at least the start of the 20th century, partly because their intervallic patterns are suited to the reinforcement of a central [[Triad (music)|triad]]. Some church modes survived into the early 18th century, as well as appearing in [[Classical period (music)|classical]] and [[20th-century music]], and [[jazz]] (see [[chord-scale system]]).