What do these measures mean at the beginning of this choral piece?

Question

The piece is "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen," and it was composed in the 1600s by Michael Praetorius. This score is edited.

score 6 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 01 '17 at 08:30

6

This shows the original key and the original clefs and the original note lengths. It is a so-called "incipit".

answered Dec 01 '17 at 08:30

It's interesting that the incipit has the same notes with the same pitch and key and twice the length - but still with the split common time symbol. I might post this as a separate question. – Tom Sharpe Dec 01 '17 at 11:27
The so-called "cut time" is often very flexible, particularly in (very) old scores. Here's a reference, which shows at least two different values for "cut time": [http://www.dolmetsch.com/musictheory4.htm] – Brian Chandler Dec 02 '17 at 18:07

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