#### 3.15.6 Ancient time signatures

There is limited support for mensural time signatures. The glyphs are hard-wired to particular time fractions. In other words, to get a particular mensural signature glyph with the `\time n/m` command, `n` and `m` have to be chosen according to the following table

Use the `style` property of grob TimeSignature to select ancient time signatures. Supported styles are `neo_mensural` and `mensural`. The above table uses the `neo_mensural` style. This style is appropriate e.g. for the incipit of transcriptions of mensural pieces. The `mensural` style mimics the look of historical printings of the 16th century.

input/test/time.ly gives an overview over all available ancient and modern styles.

##### See also

Program reference: Time signature gives a general introduction into the use of time signatures.

##### Bugs

Mensural signature glyphs are mapped to time fractions in a hard-wired way. This mapping is sensible, but still arbitrary: given a mensural time signature, the time fraction represents a modern meter that usually will be a good choice when transcribing a mensural piece of music. For a particular piece of mensural music, however, the mapping may be unsatisfactory. In particular, the mapping assumes a fixed transcription of durations (e.g. brevis = half note in 2/2, i.e. 4:1). Some glyphs (such as the alternate glyph for 6/8 meter) are not at all accessible through the `\time` command.

Mensural time signatures are supported typographically, but not yet musically. The internal representation of durations is based on a purely binary system; a ternary division such as 1 brevis = 3 semibrevis (tempus perfectum) or 1 semibrevis = 3 minima (cum prolatione maiori) is not correctly handled: event times in ternary modes will be badly computed, resulting e.g. in horizontally misaligned note heads, and bar checks are likely to erroneously fail.

The syntax and semantics of the `\time` command for mensural music is subject to change.

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