Byzantine Lyra
Earliest known depiction of lyra in a Byzantine ivory casket (900 – 1100 AD). (Museo Nazionale, Florence)
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| String instrument | |
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| Other names | Byzantine lyra, lira, lūrā, Rum Kemençe, medieval fiddle, pear-shaped rebec |
| Hornbostel–Sachs classification | 321.321–71 (Necked bowl lute sounded by a bow) |
| Developed | 9th century AD |
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The Byzantine lyra or lira (Greek: λύρα) was a medieval bowed string musical instrument in the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire. In its popular form the lyra was a pear-shaped instrument with three to five strings, held upright and played by stopping the strings from the side with fingernails. Remains of two actual examples of Byzantine lyras from the Middle ages have been found in excavations at Novgorod; one dated to 1190 AD. The first known depiction of the instrument is on a Byzantine ivory casket (900–1100 AD), preserved in the Bargello in Florence (Museo Nazionale, Florence, Coll. Carrand, No.26). Versions of the Byzantine lyra are still played throughout the former lands of the Byzantine Empire: Greece (Politiki lyra, lit. "lyra of the City" i.e. Constantinople), Crete (Cretan lyra), Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria, Republic of Macedonia, Croatia (Dalmatian Lijerica), Italy (Calabrian lira) and Turkey.
The first recorded reference to the bowed lyra was in the 9th century by the Persian geographer Ibn Khurradadhbih (d. 911); in his lexicographical discussion of instruments he cited the lyra (lūrā) as the typical instrument of the Byzantines along with the urghun (organ), shilyani (probably a type of harp or lyre) and the salandj (probably a bagpipe). The lyra spread widely via the Byzantine trade routes that linked the three continents; in the 11th and 12th centuries European writers use the terms fiddle and lira interchangeably when referring to bowed instruments. In the meantime, the rabāb, the bowed string instrument of the Arabic world, was introduced to Western Europe possibly through the Iberian Peninsula and both instruments spread widely throughout Europe giving birth to various European bowed instruments such as the medieval rebec, the Scandinavian and Icelandic talharpa. A notable example is the Italian lira da braccio, a 15th-century bowed string instrument which is considered by many as the predecessor of the contemporary violin.
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