Hi Lex, Yes, I know that illustration from the Corbetta 1639 and always wondered what sort of guitar that could be. Well, there are lute family instruments in Praetorius's Sintagma Musicum II 1618 -19 with strings fixed at the bottom edge too, plus his mentioning of metal strings on the 'violin' or something ...
Many original early-mid 17th century guitars seem to have been converted to what is usually called 'battente guitar', with introduction of canted tops and shortened original necks. However, a number of 17th century guitars that I came across with and which still retained their original flat soundboards, were provided with five pins at the bottom edge - for seemingly no other reason as to make them appear, at least externally, as 'functioning' 5-course guitars. I suspect this was mainly done at the request of instrument dealers simply to make them look more appealing to potential customers (perhaps not earlier than in the 19th - early 20th centuries). I haven't yet inspected closely the Oxford guitar that you mention but I suspect that this may well be exactly this very case. What is in your belief so different in it as compared to other surviving 17th century vaulted-back guitars? By the way, the chord chart that I mentioned about was definitely on six-line stave, not like those found in 5-course guitar books. Could those 'dodici chitarre con corde de Cetra' be simply citterns? Alexander ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lex Eisenhardt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <vihuela@cs.dartmouth.edu> Sent: Monday, October 16, 2006 8:11 PM Subject: [VIHUELA] Re: Why re-entrant tuning? > On the frontpage of Corbetta's book from 1639 there are two guitars > depicted. The one at the right is clearly a guitar with the strings fixed > at > the end of the corpus. The strings go over the bridge. Maybe strings of > wire. > Mimmo Peruffo pointed out an inventory of the deceased luthier Lorenzo > Filzer from Rome, from 1657, that mentiones 'dodici chitarre con corde de > Cetra'. > The trouble with these things is that instruments can be changed quite > easily in this respect. The examples by Sellas from Nurnberg and Oxford > are > now set up with wire strings. They differ from other instruments with > folds > and shortened necks. > The chord charts for battente guitars (5 course...) could be in every > alfabeto book from the 17th c. (like in Corbetta's, from 1639). > > Lex To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
