Cantemir was one of the most notable intellectuals of his age. He knew the major languages of the East and the West. He wrote thousands of pages on a wide variety of subjects. KİTABÜ İLMİ'L-MUSİKİ ALÂ VECHİ'L-HURÛFÂT (that is, “The Book in Which the Science of Music is Explained through Letters”), which he wrote in Turkish upon the requests of two high-ranking Ottoman civil servants, Cantemir's close friends and students, Davul İsmail Efendi and Latif Çelebi. For a long time, no serious studies were carried out on his work. In this very important work, of which several copies were made and passed from library to library for 200 years, Cantemir appears before us as a versatile author, including the inventor of the notation system, the author of the scores compilation, theorist of music, the historian of music and the composer. In my presentation, I will focus on all these aspects separately.
Key words: Notation system, scores compilation, theory of music, historian of music, composer