Today’s guitar virtuosos on platforms like YouTube captivate audiences with breathtaking riffs and techniques, constantly pushing the boundaries of music. However, the instrument they wield, in various forms, has a history stretching back to the earliest days of civilization. The journey of the guitar is a fascinating tale of continuous evolution and adaptation.
The precise origins of the guitar remain shrouded in mystery, but linguistic clues point to ancient Greece. The word “guitar” is believed to have evolved from the Greek term “kithara.” Greek mythology attributes the creation of the kithara to Hermes, who supposedly fashioned it from a tortoise shell. Depictions of Apollo, the god of music, frequently feature him playing this instrument, highlighting its cultural significance in ancient Greece.
The kithara itself was a sophisticated instrument. It featured a wooden soundboard and a box-like resonator. Two hollow arms extended from the resonator, connected by a crossbar. Initially, the kithara had three strings stretched from the crossbar to the lower end, passing over a bridge on the soundboard. Over time, the number of strings increased, reaching as many as twelve in later versions. Musicians in antiquity typically used a plectrum, a precursor to the modern guitar pick, to pluck the strings. The fingers of the left hand were employed to mute unwanted strings and, at times, to fret notes and create harmonies. Solo performers occasionally plucked strings with both hands. Interestingly, the way a kithara was held closely resembled how we hold a guitar today, and musicians even used early forms of guitar straps for comfortable playing.
Shape of the Guitar From Prehistory Through the Middle Ages
To delve deeper into Guitar History, we must consider its predecessors: the oud and the lute. These instruments predate recorded history and are considered crucial in the guitar’s lineage.
Some historical accounts even trace the oud’s origins back to biblical times. Legend attributes the design of the oud, an early Arab stringed instrument, to Lamech, a figure from the Book of Genesis and Noah’s grandfather. The story suggests Lamech was inspired by the shape of his deceased son’s body hanging from a tree, leading him to create the oud. The oud made its way to Europe with the Moors when they invaded Southern Spain in 711 AD, marking a significant step in the instrument’s westward journey.
Shape From the 15th Century to Present Day
The lute, another key ancestor of the guitar, existed in diverse shapes and sizes but generally featured a rounded back. Its influence spread from Egypt to Greece and then to Rome, with the Romans introducing it across Europe.
Archaeological evidence offers glimpses into the lute’s ancient history. An ancient pictorial record, dating back to 3500 to 3200 BCE in Southern Mesopotamia (present-day Nasiriyah City, Iraq), depicts a woman on a boat playing a lute-like instrument. The positioning of her hands clearly indicates she is playing a stringed instrument, providing early visual evidence of the lute’s existence. Throughout Mesopotamian and Egyptian history, pictorial records continued to showcase both long-necked and short-necked lutes. Museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of New York, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the British Museum house numerous examples of these depictions on clay tablets and papyrus.
By the end of the Renaissance, the lute had undergone substantial evolution, with some versions boasting up to 20 or 30 strings. However, the lute’s characteristic shape began to lose favor. During the 15th and 16th centuries, Spanish musicians started to prefer instruments with the curved shape that is now synonymous with guitars.
These instruments, known as Baroque guitars, effectively superseded the lute as the preferred stringed instrument for musicians from approximately 1600 to 1750. Further improvements, including the use of five courses of gut strings and movable frets, enhanced playability. The vihuela, another instrument popular in Spain, Portugal, and Italy during this era, featured incurving sides, giving it an hourglass-like body shape. A version of the vihuela is still used today in Mariachi music.
The Spanish guitar’s evolution reached a crucial point by the 1790s. These guitars had acquired the standard body shape and six courses of strings that closely resemble the modern guitar, although they were smaller in size. Spanish musician and guitar maker Antonio de Torres Jurado revolutionized guitar design in the mid-1800s. His innovations are considered foundational to all subsequent guitar designs, leading many to regard him as “one of the single most important inventors in the history of guitar.”
Torres Jurado’s guitars featured a broadened body, a thinner soundboard (belly), and a more pronounced curve at the waist. He also replaced traditional wooden tuning pegs with machine heads, improving tuning stability. His groundbreaking approach to body design and fan bracing—the internal system of wooden struts—gave his classical guitars their distinctive, rich tone. Influential Spanish guitarist Andrés Segovia championed Torres’ classical guitar, establishing it as a prominent concert instrument. Segovia also composed intricate musical pieces that are now recognized as “classical guitar” music, further solidifying the instrument’s place in the musical world.
Around the same time, European immigrants brought a steel-stringed version of the Spanish guitar to America. This marked the beginning of another significant chapter in guitar history, leading to the development of the flat top, archtop, and modern electric guitars.
The Modern Guitars
The flat top acoustic guitar remains the most widely played type of acoustic guitar nearly two centuries after its inception. Christian Frederick Martin, a German-born American guitar maker, is credited with creating the flat top guitar. Martin replaced the traditional fan bracing with X-bracing, a stronger system better suited to withstand the increased tension of modern steel strings, which posed challenges for earlier Torres-style guitars.
The high tension of steel strings on flat top guitars also necessitated changes in playing style. Guitarists began using picks more frequently, fundamentally altering the type of music created with these instruments. While classical guitars are known for their precise and delicate melodies, steel strings and picks facilitated brighter, chord-driven music. The increased use of picks also led to the development of the pickguard, now a standard feature below the soundhole on most flat top guitars.
Orville Gibson is widely recognized for the creation of the archtop guitar. This design incorporates f-holes, an arched top and back, and an adjustable bridge, which collectively enhance the instrument’s tone and volume. Gibson crafted guitar bodies that resembled cellos, contributing to a louder sound. Jazz and country musicians quickly adopted archtop guitars, and they also became popular in big band and swing music.
George Beauchamp and his partner Adolph Rickenbacker secured the first patent for the electric guitar in 1931. Simultaneously, numerous inventors and guitar manufacturers were exploring electric versions of these instruments. Les Paul pioneered the solid body guitar manufactured by Gibson Guitars, while Leo Fender invented the Fender Telecaster in 1951. The Fender Telecaster, Gibson Les Paul, and Gibson SG models played a crucial role in the evolution of guitars from their historical forms to the solid-body electric guitars that are ubiquitous today.
Sources
https://www.ancient.eu/Kithara/
http://www.guitarhistoryfacts.com/guitar-inventor/antonio-torres-jurado/
