Scan 125
Researches into the early history of the violin family, 1883
10 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 115. See the scan on archive.org.
1stringed instruments provided with a neck were already in use in Western Europe?
3It would probably interest only some ardent antiquaries to have a circumstantial statement of the various evidences alluded to. However, the following intimation of the existence of such an instrument in Spain, before the Moors settled in that country, is likely to interest every musical inquirer, and will probably be accepted by him as a very suggestive example.
5In the poem by the Archipreste de Hita, which, as has already been mentioned (page 85), was written in the beginning of the fourteenth century, we find, in the enumeration of the musical instruments in use in Spain at that time, two different guitars; one being called guitarra morisca, and the other guitarra latina.
7In order to avoid any possible misunderstanding, I must not omit to draw attention to the fact that some musical authors, who have quoted the poem in question, spell the latter name guitarra ladina. For instance, Ambros gives it thus incorrectly in his musical history ("Geschichte der Musik," Vol. ii., p. 508). Now, this would hardly be worth noticing, did it not happen that the Spanish word ladina signifies, according to the dictionaries, "to discourse cleverly, and with facility." Musical inquirers might therefore be led to surmise that the guitarra ladina had its name from being regarded as having a particularly persuasive sound, and admitting of an easy treatment. This surmise would, however, be unfounded. In referring to the original Spanish source, we learn that the real designation is latina, and not ladina, as compilers give it who are apt to copy from each other without investigation.
9Probably no better authority on the subject could be cited than Mariano Soriano Fuertes, who, in his "Historia de la Musica Española," (Vol. i., p. 105, Madrid, 1855), gives the poem of the Archipreste de Hita with some instructive annotations; moreover, in Vol. iv., p. 208, he refers again to the guitarra latina, and discusses the opinions of some previous Spanish writers about the antiquity of the instrument. From these investigations it would appear that the guitarra
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