Here is what I got from this source:
- The guitar has been around for a looong time -- its history can be traced back over 4000 years! There are a few theories as to where and how the instrument evolved:
- Claims that the guitar is as development of the lute
- Development of the fretted lute from fretless oud, brought to Spain by the Moors
- Ancient Greek kithara theory evidence:
- A kithara is namely a square-framed lap harp, or lyre
- Similarity between Greek word "kithara" and Spanish word "guitarra"
- Earliest Greek kitharas had only 4 strings
- Greeks hellenified old Persian name for a 4-stringed instrument, "chartar"
- The Ancestors:
- Earliest stringed instruments known to archaeologists are bowl harps and tanburs.
- Such instruments were found from ancient Sumerian, Babylonian, and Egyptian civilizations.
- The tanbur (defined as a "long-necked stringed instrument with a small egg- or pear-shaped body, with an arched or round back, usually with a soundboard of wood or hide, and a long, straight neck" was most likely developed from the bowl harp.
- Tomb paintings and stone carvings in Egypt show that harps and tanburs along with flutes and percussion instruments were being played together 3500-4000 years ago.
- In Queen Shub-Ad's tomb, during the period 2500-2000 BCE, an 11-stringed instrument with gold decoration was found, indicating the creation of more advanced harps.
- The oldest preserved guitar-like instrument (which had three strings and a plectrum hahnging from the neck by a cord) is 3500 years old and belonged to the Egyptian singer Har-Mose.
- What is a guitar?
- The guitar belongs in the tanbur family.
- Dr. Kasha defines it as having "a long, fretted neck, flat wooden soundboard, ribs, and a flat back, most often with incurved sides".
- Oldest iconographical representation: a stone carving at Alaca Huyuk in Turkey of a 3300 year old Hittite guitar.
- The Lute (Al'ud, Oud)
- The Moors brought the oud to Spain.
- Was the Arabian version of a tanbur, with changed proportions and no frets.
- Europeans added frets and called it a "lute" -- derived from Arabic "Al'ud" (meaning "the wood") and the Spanish name "laud".
- Defined as a "short-necked instrument with many strings, a large pear-shaped body with highly vaulted back, and an elaborate, sharply angled peghead".
- Types of stringed folk instruments:
- Name "guitar" comes from ancient Sanskrit word for "string" -- "tar". Many stringed instruments have names that end in "tar" with a prefix which indicates the number of strings.
- Two = Sanskrit "dvi" = modern Persian "do" --> the dotar, a 2-stringed instrument found in Turkestan.
- Three = Sanskrit "tri" = modern Persian "se" --> the setar, a 3-stringed instrument found in Iran, and the Indian sitar is an instrument that is elaborately developed and contains many strings.
- Four = Sanskrit "chatur" = modern Persian "char" --> the chartar, a 4-stringed instrument from Persia, most commonly known as "tar" in modern usage, and the guitarra was an early Spanish 4-string guitar, quthara in Arabic and chitarra in Italian, etc.
- Five = Sanskrit "pancha" = modern Persian "panj" --> the panchtar, a 5-stringed instrument from Afghanistan.
- The guitar originally had four pairs of unison-tuned strings, and by the beginning of the Renaissance, this guitar had become dominant in most of Europe.
- Earliest known music for 4-stringed "chitarra" was written in 16th century Spain.
- The 5-course guitarra battente first appeared in Italy at around the same time and replaced the 4-stringed instrument.
- Standard tuning at A, D, G, B, E (like top 5 strings of modern guitar).
- Then, during the 17th century, a sixth course of strings was added to the Italian "guitarra battente".
- Spanish maker Antonio Torres Jurado increased the size of the body, changed its proportions, and invented the "fan" top bracing pattern in around 1850, thus creating the modern "classical" guitar that soon became accepted as the standard, and have remained relatively unchanged to this day.
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