Editing Sheet music (section)

===Precursors to sheet music===
[[Musical notation]] was developed before parchment or paper were used for writing. The earliest form of musical notation can be found in a [[cuneiform script|cuneiform]] tablet that was created at [[Nippur]], in [[Sumer]] (today's [[Iraq]]), in about 2000&nbsp;BC. The tablet represents fragmentary instructions for performing music, that the music was composed in harmonies of thirds, and that it was written using a [[diatonic scale]].<ref name="Kilmer1986">{{cite journal |last1=Kilmer |first1=Anne D. |date=1986 |title=Old Babylonian Musical Instructions Relating to Hymnody |jstor=1359953|journal=[[Journal of Cuneiform Studies]]|publisher=The American Schools of Oriental Research  |volume=38 |issue=1 |pages=94–98 |doi=10.2307/1359953|s2cid=163942248 }}</ref>

A tablet from about 1250&nbsp;BC shows a more developed form of notation.<ref name="Kilmer 1965">{{cite journal |last=Kilmer |first=Anne D. |editor1-last=Güterbock |editor1-first=Hans G. |editor2-last=Jacobsen |editor2-first=Thorkild |date=21 April 1965 |title=The Strings of Musical Instruments: their Names, Numbers, and Significance |url=https://oi.uchicago.edu/sites/oi.uchicago.edu/files/uploads/shared/docs/as16.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141023122111/http://oi.uchicago.edu/sites/oi.uchicago.edu/files/uploads/shared/docs/as16.pdf |archive-date=2014-10-23 |url-status=live |journal=Assyriological Studies |location=Chicago |publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]] |volume=16 |pages=261–268}}</ref> Although the interpretation of the notation system is still controversial, it is clear that the notation indicates the names of strings on a [[lyre]], the tuning of which is described in other tablets.<ref name="West 1994">{{cite journal |last1=West |first1=M. L.|author-link1=Martin Litchfield West |date=1994 |title=The Babylonian Musical Notation and the Hurrian Melodic Texts |jstor=737674  |journal=[[Music & Letters]] |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |volume=75 |issue=2 |pages=161–179 |doi=10.1093/ml/75.2.161}}</ref> Although they are fragmentary, these tablets represent the earliest notated [[melody|melodies]] found anywhere in the world.<ref name="West 1994" />

[[File:Delphichymn.jpg|thumb|The original stone at Delphi containing the second of the two [[Delphic Hymns]] to [[Apollo]]. The music notation is the line of occasional symbols ''above'' the main, uninterrupted line of Greek lettering.]]
[[Music of ancient Greece|Ancient Greek]] musical notation was in use from at least the 6th century&nbsp;BC until approximately the 4th century&nbsp;AD; several complete compositions and fragments of compositions using this notation survive. The notation consists of symbols placed above text syllables. An example of a complete composition is the [[Seikilos epitaph]], which has been variously dated between the 2nd century&nbsp;BC to the 1st century&nbsp;AD.

In ancient Greek music, three hymns by [[Mesomedes]] of [[Crete]] exist in manuscript. One of the oldest known examples of music notation is a papyrus fragment of the Hellenic era play ''[[Orestes (play)|Orestes]]'' (408&nbsp;BC), which contains musical notation for a choral ode. Ancient Greek notation appears to have fallen out of use around the time of the [[Decline of the Roman Empire]].