Rabāba (spike fiddle)
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Alternative TitleRabāb. |
InstrumentRabab |
Instrument FamilyStrings |
Place MadeNorthern Africa ; Egypt ; Africa |
Date MadeCirca 1970 |
DescriptionTechnical description: Coconut shell body perforated with 10 holes spaced around body. Long neck terminating in animal horn glued on. Skin sound board. The bridge is made from a piece of papyrus. 2 strings made of twisted horse hair. 2 wooden pegs (cylindrical in shape) inserted laterally on the neck, one on either side. Historical sources and dispersal: The term rabab has long been used to denote chordophones at least since early medieval Arabic texts of the 9th and 10th centuries. In 1931, H.G. Farmer distinguished between the raba ̅b as a bowed instrument and the ruba ̅b as a plucked chordophone, although the difference in spellings are not written in early Arabic texts and cannot be maintained in references to more modern variations of the instrument. In Western Islam (North Africa and Arab countries), the name raba ̅b refers primarily to spike fiddles like this one. The spike fiddle with a gourd or coconut resonator covered with a skin belly, like this one, is widely distributed from North Africa to Southeast and East Asia. In Egypt the instrument comes in two shapes: the single-string, quadrangular rabāb al-shā‘ir (‘poet’s fiddle’) and the two-string rabāb al-mughannī (‘singer’s fiddle’), tuned in 5ths. The quadrangular shape has mainly disappeared (except in Sinai) and its epic repertory has been transferred to the hemispherical two-string spike fiddle, now called simply rabāba. |
NotesP.R. Cooke, 1995. |
Measurements770. |
Provenanceon loan to the Collection. |
CollectionMIMEd |
Accession Number2061 |