Minima
Historic note value of mensural notation, roughly equal to today's half note.
What it means
The minima is a note value of mensural notation, the system of notation of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It corresponds roughly to our half note (minim). Its name ("the smallest") recalls that at the end of the 13th century it was the shortest value; later still shorter values such as the semiminima and fusa were added.
In the notation
The minima is written as a note with a stem and an open, in white mensural notation hollow, note head. In black mensural notation the head was filled in.
Musical use
Its relation to the next longer note, the semibrevis, depended on the prolatio: it could contain two or three minims. Unlike today, the value of a note was therefore not always fixed but determined by context. In the white notation of the 15th and 16th centuries the minima was often counted as the unit of the beat.
The minima should be distinguished from the modern half note, which always equals two crotchets: the minima has no fixed value and is historically embedded.
Performance practice
When you play Renaissance music from original notation or in transcription, treat the minima as the basic beat: the tactus often falls on it. Note its relation to the semibrevis and semiminima and sing it with a calm, even flow.