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ROTTA, CHROTTA, HROTTA (Fr. Cithare, ...

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Originally appearing in Volume V23, Page 765 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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ROTTA, CHROTTA, HROTTA (Fr. Cithare, rotta; Ger, Cytharr„ Rotta) , a See also:medieval stringed See also:instrument derived from the See also:Greek See also:cithara. The rotta possessed, in See also:common with all other forerunners of the See also:violin, the See also:chief structural features of the cithara, i.e. the See also:box See also:sound-See also:chest composed of back765 and belly either See also:flat or delicately arched connected by ribs. The rotta represents the first step in the See also:evolution of the cithara, when arms and See also:cross-See also:bar were replaced by a See also:frame joined to the See also:body, the strings being usually restricted to eight or less. Examples of these See also:early rottas abound in miniatures from the 8th to the 12th See also:century or even the 14th, such as See also:Cotton MS. See also:Vespasian A. I. (Brit. Mils.), 700 A.D., and the MS. copy in the See also:Durham See also:Cathedral Library of the See also:Cassiodorus Commentary on the See also:Psalms i manu Bedae. The most interesting is a real specimen of See also:wood found in an Alamannic See also:tomb of the 4th to the 7th century at Oberflacht2 in the See also:Black See also:Forest, and now preserved in the Volker Museum, See also:Berlin. The next step was the addition of a See also:finger-See also:board and the consequent reduction of the strings to three or four, since each See also:string was now capable of producing several notes. In the Carolingian See also:Bible presented to See also:Charles the Bald3 by See also:Count See also:Vivian of See also:Tours there is a See also:fine example of the rotta at this See also:stage, in which the artist has reproduced the position of the fingers of the See also:left See also:hand stopping the strings, and of the right hand plucking them.

The same instrument occurs in a See also:

companion Bible, known as the Bible of St See also:Paul because it was preserved in the monastery of that name " without the walls " at See also:Rome. Although these See also:MSS. were executed in the 9th century, they do not represent contemporary scenes, but were inspired by Romano-See also:Christian See also:models, if not actually copied from older MSS. This is the only See also:representation yet found of the finger-board thus applied to the rotta. In the final transition pre-ceding the transformation into the See also:guitar, the rotta appears as a guitar-shaped instrument without See also:neck or See also:head and having a hole large enough to allow the hand to pass through left in the body on each See also:side of the strings. At first this instrument, which See also:developed into the crwth, was twanged with the fingers, but in the 1th century it was played with a See also:bow, the See also:bridge having been slightly raised on feet. The first (and perhaps also the second) of these transitions was accomplished in the Christian See also:East, where, however, the upper frame of the earliest rotta seems to have been at once discarded in favour or a See also:long neck with frets, for which the tanbur undoubtedly supplied the See also:idea. This evolution is to be traced in the miniatures of a single MS., which supplies examples of all the transitions. The miniatures illustrate the Psalms in the See also:Utrecht Psalter; they were beyond doubt originally designed to accompany a Greek or See also:Syriac version.' The Utrecht Psalter, executed in the See also:diocese of See also:Reims under Anglo-Saxon See also:influence during the 9th century, is no servile copy, but it owes much of its See also:inspiration and See also:local See also:colour to an unknown Greek or Syrian prototype. As soon as the neck was added to the guitar-shaped body, the instrument ceased to be a rotta and became a guitar (q.v.), or a guitar-See also:fiddle (q.v.) if played with the bow. Of the rotta, there were two distinct types, the one derived from the cithara, the rotta proper, and the other derived from the See also:lyre, which survived to the 18th century as the Welsh crwth. Although the various forms of the name came to be applied somewhat indiscriminately in different countries and epochs to both types, yet the structural features of both remained true to their respective archetypes. The words rotta in See also:England and cythara in See also:Germany seem to have clung more especially to the first of these types, while the forms crwth, See also:crowd, crouth were reserved for the bowed See also:instruments, the earliest of which appeared in the i rth century.' The crwth or crowd, so popular in England during the 14th century, does not seem to have won equal favour in Germany, where at that See also:time the nidel or guitar-fiddle had been popularized by the See also:minnesingers.

The crwth derived from the lyre underwent no further development. (K.

End of Article: ROTTA, CHROTTA, HROTTA (Fr. Cithare, rotta; Ger, Cytharr„ Rotta)

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