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Was the Arabian and Persian Lute Fretted ?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011
Extract
It was in reference to this claim that I was once asked by the author of Musik des Orients (1929), Dr. Robert Lachmann, now the director of the Department of Extra European Music at the University of Jerusalem, whether I had actual evidence in regard to frets on the Arabian and Persian lute in the Middle Ages. He asked the question because a German writer, Karl Geiringer, had searched Arabic and Persian manuscripts which gave delineations of the lute without finding a solitary example which revealed the presence of frets on the instrument.
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- Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1937
References
Page 453 note 1 Geiringer, Karl, “Vorgeschichte und Geschichte der europ. Laute” in Zeitschrift für Musikwissenschaft, x (1927–1928), p. 570Google Scholar.
Page 454 note 1 Dr. Lachmann has since repudiated reliance on Geiringer's argument. See Zeitschrift fur vergleichende Musikwissenschaft, ii (1934), p. 601Google Scholar.
Page 454 note 2 Mafātīḥ al-'ulum, ed. Van Vloten, G., p. 238Google Scholar.
Page 454 note 3 Lexicon Persico-Latinum (Bonn, 1855–1864)Google Scholar.
Page 455 note 1 Al-sMufaḍḍal ibn Salama, ff. 31, 33.
Page 455 note 2 Strịctly speaking a collective.
Page 455 note 3 Mafatīḥ al-'ulūm, p. 239.
Page 456 note 1 Kitāb al-aghani, Bulak, ed., v, 57–8Google Scholar.
Page 456 note 2 Ibid., vi, 78–80.
Page 455 note 3 British Museum MS., Or. 2361, fol. 165, v.
Page 456 note 4 Ibid., fol. 236, v.
Page 457 note 1 Leyden University MS., No. 1427, fol. 52, v. Kosegarten, , Lib. Cant., pp. 77, 79Google Scholar. D'Erlanger, R., La musique arabe, i, 166Google Scholar. Land, , “Recherches sur l'histoire de la gamme arabe,” in Actes du Sixieme congres Inter, des Orientalistes, … 1883, pt. i, pp. 100, 133Google Scholar.
Page 457 note 2 Les prairies a'or, viii, 99. The text has 
but 
is intended.
Page 457 note 3 Bombay ed., 1887–8, i, 98.
Page 457 note 4 India Office MS., No. 1811, fol. 173. See JRAS., 1937, pp. 251–5.
Page 457 note 5 British Museum MS., Or. 2361, fol. 235, v.
Page 457 note 6 British Museum MS., Or. 136, fol. 3, v.
Page 457 note 7 Cairo National Library MS., funûn jamîla, 539, fol. 89.
Page 458 note 1 Part of this scene is reproduced here by the courtesy of Messrs. Bernard Quaritch. The artist has delineated the frets on the instrument with such care that I have been prompted to take measurements of them. We may safely suppose that a string vibrating between the nut (anf) and the bridge-tailpiece (mushṭ) measures 80 mm. The khinsir (4th finger fret) would therefore be at 20 mm. These measurements allow for seven frets from the sabbāba (1st finger fret) to the khinsir (4th finger fret) inclusive. This, together with the five tuning pegs, shows that the system of Ṣafi al-Dīn 'Abd al-Mu'min (d. 1294) was still in vogue.
Page 459 note 1 Le traié de rapports musicaux …. par Safi ed-Din 'Abd el-Mumin … par de Vaux, M. le Baron Carra, Paris, 1891, pp. 53–4Google Scholar.
Page 459 note 2 British Museum MSS., Or. 136, Or. 2361. Berlin MS., Landberg, 11, Paris Bibl. Nat., MS., Arabe 2865. Bodleian MSS., Marsh, 115, Marsh, 161, Marsh, 521.
Page 460 note 1 British Museum MS., Or. 136. Paris MS., Arabe, 2865.
Page 460 note 2 Leyden MS., No. 1427, fol. 52, Kosegarten, v., Lib. Cant., p. 77Google Scholar. Land, op. cit., p. 100.
Page 460 note 2 Cambridge, King's College, No. 211. India Office MS., No. 2763.
Page 460 note 3 British Museum MS., Or. 2361.