321.312-71 Spike box lutes or spike guitars sounded by bowing with a bow

Rebab al mughanni, or rabab assa'ir, or "poet's fiddle": a spike fiddle. The wooden spike supports a square wooden framework round which a piece of hide is sewn, forming a resonator. The hide is pierced at the corners at the front. The neck is set at an angle to the body, its back is rounded and its face has two grooves. The peg passes through the neck from front to back, and the string is secured with cord and ribbon. The string is made of plaited horsehair. At the upper end of the neck is tied a pad of cloth to act as a nut, a woollen cord is tied around both nut and string. There is no tailpiece, but the string is tied to a cord which is in turn attached to the lower end of the spike. The bridge consists of a rectangular block of wood.

object
MUSEUM NUMBER
37.108
PLACE
COLLECTION
MEASUREMENTS
overall: 170 x 215 x 100 mm
MATERIAL/TECHNIQUE
wood; hide; hair; vegetable fibre; FI; textile; metal thread
CATEGORY
Musical Instruments
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