From such evidence as we now possess, it would seem that the evolution
of the early guitar with a neck from the Greek cithara took place
under Greek influence in the Christian East. The various stages of
this transition have been definitely established by the remarkable
miniatures of the Utrecht Psalter.[2] Two kinds of citharas are shown:
the antique rectangular,[3] and the later design with rounded body
having at the point where the arms are added indications of the waist
or incurvations characteristic of the outline of the Spanish
guitar.[4] The first stage in the transition is shown by a cithara or
rotta[5] in which arms and transverse bar are replaced by a kind of
frame repeating the outline of the body and thus completing the second
lobe of the Spanish guitar. The next stages in the transition are
concerned with the addition of a neck[6] and of frets.[7] All these
instruments are twanged by the fingers. One may conclude that the use
of the bow was either unknown at this time (c. 6th century A.D.), or
that it was still confined to instruments of the rebab type. The
earliest known representation of a guitar fiddle complete with bow[8]
(fig. 2) occurs in a Greek Psalter written and illuminated in Caesarea
by the archpriest Theodorus in 1066 (British Museum, Add. MS. 19352).
Instances of perfect guitar fiddles abound in the 13th century MSS.
and monuments, as for instance in a picture by Cimabue (1240-1302). in
the Pitti Gallery in Florence.[9]
[Illustration: From a Byzantine MS. in the British Museum.