The harp lute, or dital harp, is a musical instrument that combines features of

harp The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has a number of individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orche ...

and

lute A lute ( or ) is any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity, usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted. More specifically, the term "lute" can ref ...

and to increase its compass of the latter. It was invented in 1795 by Edward Light., (though an earlier form is shown in the "'' Garden of Earthly Delights"'' (~1500) by Hieronymus Bosch).

Description

The harp lute owes the first part of its name to the characteristic mechanism for shortening the effective length of the strings; its second name of "dital harp" emphasizes the nature of the stops, which are worked by the thumb in contradistinction to the pedals of the

worked by the feet. This instrument consists of a pear-shaped body, to which is added a curved neck supported on a front pillar or arm springing from the body, and therefore reminiscent of the

. There are twelve catgut strings. The curved fingerboard, almost parallel with the neck, is provided with

fret A fret is any of the thin strips of material, usually metal wire, inserted laterally at specific positions along the neck or fretboard of a stringed instrument. Frets usually extend across the full width of the neck. On some historical instrume ...

s, and has in addition a thumbkey for each string, by means of which the accordance of the string is mechanically raised a semitone at will. The dital or key, on being depressed, acts upon a stop-ring or eye, which draws the string down against the fret, and thus shortens its effective length. The fingers then stop the strings as usual over the remaining frets. A further improvement was patented in 1816 as the British harp lute. Other attempts possessing less practical merit than the dital harp were the lyra-guitarre, which appeared in Germany, at the beginning of the 19th century; the accord-guitarre, towards the middle of the same century; and the keyed guitar.

Description

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Further reading