A square matrix is a matrix with the same number of rows and columns. It can be classified as singular or nonsingular. Special types of square matrices include symmetric matrices where the matrix is equal to its transpose and skew-symmetric matrices where the matrix is equal to the negative of its transpose. Any square matrix can be uniquely expressed as the sum of a symmetric matrix and a skew-symmetric matrix using the formula C = (1/2)(C + C^T) + (1/2)(C - C^T).