Thanks for the info. But did our historical forebears think of
these words "good" and "bad" in the context of morality or
religion?
Good question!
Diruta uses "bona" & "cattiva". "Cattivo /a " today definitely means bad, also in a moral
sense, or the way awful children are ;)) Am I right, dear Italian colleagues? And then,
end of 16th century?
I could imagine that it had the meaning "miserable" before (it is derived from the word for
"prisoner.")
In German there is "gut" and "schlecht" - where "schlecht" originally meant "simple",
"unadorned" , a meaning that is kept by the word "schlicht" today.
Brossard (beginning of 18th cent.) cites the Italian terms and translates them as "bon" and
"mauvais", giving the whole thing a technical (not theological :) twist by saying that
"good" means a good beat to do some things, i.e. to put some notes or "cesures", whereas
"bad" is a good opportunity to get rid of some bad notes = dissonances.
By the way you can download the 3rd and 6th edition of the dictionary as well as the English
version by Grassineau (1740) from
http://imslp.org/wiki/Dictionnaire_de_musique_(Brossard,_S%C3%A9bastien_de)
best wishes
Bernd
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