The preceding post traced the development of the colorfully named pig’s head psaltery from the 13th century through its mechanization near the end of the 19th century by the addition of damper bars. I promised to retell the same tale in a follow-up post — this one — focused entirely on its wing-shaped cousin. Beginning with a quick reminding look at a pig’s head psaltery, here is a typical representation in a sculpture on the 15th-century portal of the Saint Pierre Cathedral in Saintes, France.

This design appears to have been split down the middle in a comparable statuette on a late-14th-century gravesite monument in La Chaise-Dieu, France. The photo was taken at an angle from below and does not show the proportionality of the instrument’s sides as a frontal view would.

Continue reading “The autoharp takes wing” →

The following image comes from a mid-15th-century panel painting attributed to the workshop of Jan van Eyck. I’m aware of the pitfalls of assessing pictorial representations of musical instruments and might question a few details of the lute seen here. The psaltery and harp appear to be quite credible.

The bass strings of the psaltery are placed closest to the body of the player, who holds a quill in each hand. The right one is positioned to move across the entire stringbed, while the left one is centered on the bass strings. This asymmetrical design is termed a “wing shape.”

Continue reading “A pig-headed approach to the autoharp” →