Dear All, I think Roman's suggestion does make sense - Stephen Barber, who has detailed first hand knowledge of the Dias instrument has shown that its present soundboard dates from the early 18th century which is unequivocal proof of significant work being carried out to the instrument long after the Renaissance vihuela had been forgotten. The only reason for working on the instrument at that time would surely have been for use as a contemporary instrument. There are instances of pegs being added to instruments in this way - the c.1550 Magno Dieffopruchar 6 course lute has an extra hole drilled in its pegbox which does not belong to its working life as a lute.
I visited Stephen & Sandi's workshop recently and played their copies of the "Chambure" vihuela which have a lovely sound and are visually very beautiful. One of their new slightly scaled down versions of the instrument was being built, which looked very promising. There is a lot of interesting information of great relevance to this discussion on their website for anyone that's interested. Best wishes, Denys > > Perhaps a clue would be if the hole were the correct size to hold a peg, > > presumably, though not necessarily, it would be the same size as the other > > peg holes. Also, the hole would be slightly conical to accommodate the > > shape of the peg. There might also be a residue of chalk, soap or whatever > > was used to dope pegs back then. > > > > To me that might seem most likely to indicate an early experiment with 6 > > courses on a guitar. Would that make more sense historically? > Isn't the guitar simply "a vihuela missing 1st and 6th courses" in some > vihuelist's words? > RT > ______________ > Roman M. Turovsky > http://polyhymnion.org/swv > > > >