Lyre-guitar

Lyre-guitar (Fr.: lyre-guitare; Ger.: Lyragitarre; It.: chitarra-lira), 1. guitar of late-18th-c. Fr. invention, in form of a modified kithara, with a central fingerboard, usually 6 but occasionally 9 strings, fretted, and with a guitar-type string holder. The 6-stringed variety was tuned E0 A0 d0 g0 b0 e1. Despite the elegance of its form it was unwieldy to play, but this did not prevent it from enjoying considerable popularity all over Europe during the first 3 decades of the 19th c…