Scan 38
Researches into the early history of the violin family, 1883
10 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 28. See the scan on archive.org.
1Barrington. The strings are exhibited as drawn through little holes at the top of the neck and fastened at the back of the head, precisely as they are on the Persian rebab in my possession. In fact, this contrivance is very common on the instruments of the Arabs, Persians, and Hindus. Furthermore, the contrivance of placing one foot of the bridge through the sound-hole, in order to cause the pressure of the strings to be resisted by the back of the instrument instead of by the belly, is not so extraordinary and peculiar to the crwth as most writers on Welsh music maintain. It may be seen on certain oriental instruments of the fiddle kind, which are not provided with a soundpost. For instance, the bridge is thus placed on the three-stringed fiddle of the modern Greeks, which is only a variety of the ordinary rebab, but which the Greeks call lyra. Inappropriate as the latter designation may appear, it is suggestive, inasmuch as it points to the ancient lyre as the progenitor of the fiddle.
3Before scrutinising the early history of the crwth, it will be advisable to ascertain the meaning of its name as it is explained in the dictionaries of the Welsh language.
5William Richards ("Welsh Dictionary," London, 1798; new edition, Carmarthen, 1828-32) defines the crwth as "a musical instrument called a croud, a fiddle; from the Greek choros (a dance) and kitharis (a harp). Crwth halen, a salt-box. Crythor, one that plays upon a croud, a fiddler."
7Spurrell ("Welsh Dictionary") has: "Crwth (plural crythau), anything swelling out; a bulge, a trunk, a belly; a crowd, a violin."
9Thus also William Owen ("A Dictionary of the Welsh Language," London, 1803): "Crwth (pl. crythau), any body swelling out; a bulging, a paunch; a kind of box scooped out of a piece of wood and rounded, except on the sides where the excavation is made, which is flat, and covered with a board ending in a tail to hang it up by, when it appears much like a bottle, having a hole on the upper part of the rotundity, through which it is filled. It is used mostly to hold salt, and hence a salt-box of any form is called crwth halen. Also a musical instrument with six strings, the two lowest of which are drones struck by the thumb, whilst the
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