BARBITON or BARBITOS, ancient stringed instrument known to us from the Greek and Roman classics, but derived from Persia. Although in use in Asia Minor, Italy, Sicily, and Greece, it is evi dent that the barbiton never won for itself a place in the affections of the Greeks of Hellas ; it was regarded as a barbarian in strument affected by only those whose tastes in matters of art were unorthodox.
In outline it resembled a large lute with a wide neck, and the seven or nine strings of the lyre. Although it probably under went considerable modification at the hands of the Greeks, it retained until the end the characteristics of the lyre whose strings were plucked, whereas the rebab was sounded by means of the bow at the time of its introduction into Europe.
An instrument called barbiton was known in the early part of the 16th and during the 17th century. It was a kind of theorbo or bass-lute, but with one neck only, bent back at right angles to form the head. Robert Fludd gives a detailed de scription of it with an illustration. The people called it a theorbo, but the scholar having identified it with the instrument of classic Greece and Rome called it barbiton.