The guitar is derived from the cithara[5] both structurally and
etymologically. It is usually asserted that the guitar was introduced
into Spain by the Arabs, but this statement is open to the gravest
doubts. There is no trace among the instruments of the Arabs known to
us of any similar to the guitar in construction or shape, although a
guitar (fig. 2) with slight incurvations was known to the ancient
Egyptians.[6] There is also extant a fine example of the guitar, with
ribs and incurvations and a long neck provided with numerous frets, on
a Hittite bas-relief on the dromos at Euyuk (_c_. 1000 B.C.) in
Cappadocia.[7] Unless other monuments of much later date should come
to light showing guitars with ribs, we shall be justified in assuming
that the instrument, which required skill in construction, died out in
Egypt and in Asia before the days of classic Greece, and had to be
evolved anew from the cithara by the Greeks of Asia Minor. That the
evolution should take place within the Byzantine Empire or in Syria
would be quite consistent with the traditions of the Greeks and their
veneration for the cithara, which would lead them to adapt the neck
and other improvements to it, rather than adopt the rebab, the tanbur
or the barbiton from the Persians or Arabians. This is, in fact, what
seems to have taken place. It is true that in the 14th century in an
enumeration of musical instruments by the Archipreste de Hita, a
_guitarra morisca_ is mentioned and unfavourably compared with the
_guitarra latina_; moreover, the Arabs of the present day still use an
instrument called _kuitra_ (which in N. Africa would be guithara), but
it has a vaulted back, the body being like half a pear with a long
neck; the strings are twanged by means of a quill. The Arab instrument
therefore belongs to a different class, and to admit the instrument as
the ancestor of the Spanish guitar would be tantamount to deriving the
guitar from the lute.[8]
By piecing together various indications given by Spanish writers, we
obtain a clue to the identity of the medieval instruments, which, in
the absence of absolute proof, is entitled to serious consideration.
From Bermudo's work, quoted above, we learn that the guitar and the
_vihuela da mano_ were practically identical, differing only in
accordance and occasionally in the number of strings.[9] Three kinds
of vihuelas were known in Spain during the middle ages, distinguished
by the qualifying phrases _da arco_ (with bow), _da mano_ (by hand),
_da penola_ (with quill). Spanish scholars[10] who have inquired into
this question of identity state that the _guitarra latina_ was
afterwards known as the _vihuela da mano_, a statement fully supported
by other evidence. As the Arab _kuitra_ was known to be played by
means of a quill, we shall not be far wrong in identifying it with the
_vihuela da penola_. The word _vihuela_ or _vigola_ is connected with
the Latin _fidicula_ or _fides_, a stringed instrument mentioned by
Cicero[11] as being made from the wood of the plane-tree and having
many strings. The remaining link in the chain of identification is
afforded by St Isidore, bishop of Seville in the 7th century, who
states that fidicula was another name for cithara, "Veteres aut
citharas fidicula vel fidice nominaverunt."[12] The fidicula therefore
was the cithara, either in its original classical form or in one of
the transitions which transformed it into the guitar. The existence of
a superior _guitarra latina_ side by side with the _guitarra morisca_
is thus explained. It was derived directly from the classical cithara
introduced by the Romans into Spain, the archetype of the structural
beauty which formed the basis of the perfect proportions and delicate
structure of the violin. In an inventory[13] made by Philip van Wilder
of the musical instruments which had belonged to Henry VIII. is the
following item bearing on the question: "foure gitterons with iiii.
cases _they are called Spanishe Vialles_." _Vial_ or _viol_ was the
English equivalent of _vihuela_. The transitions whereby the cithara
acquired a neck and became a guitar are shown in the miniatures (fig.
3) of a single MS., the celebrated Utrecht Psalter, which gave rise to
so many discussions. The Utrecht Psalter was executed in the diocese
of Reims in the 9th century, and the miniatures, drawn by an
Anglo-Saxon artist attached to the Reims school, are unique, and
illustrate the Psalter, psalm by psalm. It is evident that the
Anglo-Saxon artist, while endowed with extraordinary talent and vivid
imagination, drew his inspiration from an older Greek illustrated
Psalter from the Christian East,[14] where the evolution of the guitar
took place.
[Illustration: From Denon's _Voyage in Egypt_.