Regal

Regal [possibly Fr. *rigole] (Fr.: régale; Ger.: Regal; Sp.: realejo), originally a small portable organ containing *regal pipes exclusively. Its relationship to the organ has been likened by Mahrenholz to that of the harmonium to our modern organ: an independent form of instr. While the word “regal” is not encountered before the mid-15th c., Gastoué has shown the instr. itself to be far older (in Engl. literature the word does not occur before 1546). At first the regal was provided with a…