MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS - online book

The History And Development Of Musical Instruments From The Earliest Times.

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	MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS.	93
	cally interesting inasmuch as it represents a rotta of an oblong square shape like that just noticed and resembling the Welsh crwth. It has only five strings which the performer twangs with his fingers. Again, a very interesting representation (which we engrave) of the Psalmist with a kind of rotta occurs in a manu-s:ript of the tenth century, in the British museum (Vi-tellius F. XL). The manu­script' has been much in­jured by a fire in the year 1731 ; but professor West-wood has succeeded, with great care, and with the aid of a magnifying glass, in making out the lines of the figure. As it has been as­certained that the psalter is written in the Irish semi-uncial character it is highly probable that the kind of rotta represents the Irish donor emit, which was played by twanging the strings and also by the ap­plication of a bow. Unfor­tunately we possess no well - authenticated repre­sentation of the Welsh crwtk of an early period; otherwise we should in all probability find it played with the fingers, or with a plec­trum. Venantius Fortunatus, an Italian who lived in the second half of the sixth century, mentions in a poem the " Chrotta Britanna." He does not, however, allude to the bow, and there

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