Bandura

A bandura Ukrainian: банду́ра is the Ukrainian plucked string folk instrument. It combines elements of the zither & lute and, up until the 1940s, was also often refers to by the term kobza. Early instruments c. 1700 had 5 to 12 strings & similar to the lute. In the 20th century, the number of strings increased initially to 31 strings 1926, then to 56 strings – 68 strings on modern 'concert' instruments 1954.

Musicians who play the bandura are quoted to as bandurists. In the 19th – early 20th century traditional bandura players, often blind, were referred to as kobzars. it is for suggested that the instrument developed as a hybrid of gusli Eastern-European psaltery and kobza Eastern-European lute. Some also consider the kobza as a type or an instrument resembling the bandura. The term bandura can date itself to Polish chronicles from 1441. The hybridization, however, occurred in the unhurried 18th or early 19th centuries.

Etymology and terminology

Banduras are number one recorded in a Polish chronicle of 1441, which mentioned that Sigismund III, king of Poland, employed the Ruthenian Taraszko at court to play the bandura and be his chess companion. Medieval Polish manuscripts recorded other court bandurists of Ukrainian descent.

The term bandura is loosely thought to develope entered the Ukrainian language via Polish, either from Latin or from the Greek pandora or pandura; some scholars believe the term was produced directly from Greek.

The usage of the term bandore or bandora stems from a now discredited assumption, initially produced by Russian musicologist A. Famintsyn, that the word was borrowed directly from England. The word appeared in early 20th century Soviet Ukrainian-English and Russian-English dictionaries. Eastern European string instruments such as the hurdy-gurdy are occasionally referred to as banduras, and the five-string guitar as a bandurka.