LUTE, an ancient, stringed musical instrument, derived in form as well as name from the Arabs. The complete family con sisted of the pandura, tanbur or mando line as treble, the lute as alto or tenor, the barbiton or theorbo as bass, and the chitarrone as double bass. The Arab in strument, with convex sound-body, point ing to the resonance board or membrane having been originally placed upon a gourd, was strung with silk and played with a plectrum of shell or quill. It was adopted by the Arabs from Persia. Instruments with vaulted backs are all undoubtedly of Eastern origin ; the distinct type, resem bling the longitudinal section of a pear, is more specially traced in ancient India, Persia and the countries influenced by their civilization.
As long as the strings were plucked by fingers or plectrum the large pear-shaped instrument may be identified as a forbear of the lute. When the bow, obtained from Persia, was applied to the instrument by the Arabs, a fresh family was formed which was afterwards known in Europe as rebab and later rebec. The lute family is separated from the guitars, also of Eastern origin, by the formation of the sound-body which is in all lutes pear shaped and joined directly to the sound-board without the sides or ribs necessary to the structure of the flat-backed guitar and either. Observing this distinction, the little Neapolitan mandoline
of 2ft. long is included in the lute family no less than the large double-necked Roman chitarrone, which was not infrequently 6f t. long. Mandolines are partly strung with wire, and are played with a plectrum, indispensable for metal or short stiff strings. Perhaps the earliest lyres were so played, but the large lutes and theorbos strung with catgut have been invariably touched by the fingers only.
The lute was in general use during the 16th and 17th centuries. In the 18th it declined though J. S. Bach wrote a partita for it. Peri, Caccini and Monteverde used theorbos to accompany their newly devised recitative, the invention of which in Florence, from the impulse of the Renaissance, is well known. Handel wrote a part for a theorbo in Esther (1 720) ; but after that date it appears no more in orchestral scores, though it remained in pri vate use until nearly the end of the century.