Citole (Noun)
Meaning
A 16th century musical instrument resembling a guitar with a pear-shaped soundbox and wire strings.
Classification
Nouns denoting man-made objects.
Examples
- During his Renaissance revival concerts, the lutenist was occasionally joined by a player on the lesser-known citole.
- A professional maker, the craftsman spent most of his career constructing and repairing a wide variety of instruments, including the emerging guitar and its precursor, the citole.
- The citole's precursor, the lute, was reintroduced to Western Europe by Crusaders returning from the Holy Land and gave rise to a diversity of variants including the citole.
- 16th-century portraiture often included music as a signifier of the wealthy family's sophistication and involved depictions of the time's musical instruments including harps, viols, and cities, and on one wall, an especially unusual citole.
- String and neck alignment variation might signal functional properties distinctive of plucked musical instrument versions – the modern orchestral tenor lute and 15th-century pear-shaped citole represent instances among other available versions.