10 pegs but 9 strings?

[Bev Ross]

Hello forum people!  I joined so I could post a question that has been perplexing me for some time.  Current thinking seems to be that the the top course of the baroque guitar is usually left single.  In Monica Hall's stringing article there's one sentence about this -- "the first course was usually a single string."  Unlike the rest of the article, though, there is little documentary evidence offered for this.  I realize, of course, that evidence exists (i.e., in a prior post Monica cite's Amat as saying the first course is single).  But, doesn't it seem weird that baroque guitars were unanimously (?) made with 10 pegs -- why not only nine if no one used double strings on the first course? 

I've a copy of a circa 1750 guitar (maker unknown) in a Paris museum  -- wonderful guitar made by Wolfgang Früh -- and the nut (original and copy) was slotted for a only a single string on the top course (but it still has the ten pegs). Maybe there were ten pegs so guitarists could carry around an extra peg!  Always prepared!

I've seen paintings with both single and double strung top courses.  Not sure of the evidence from surviving period instruments.  I had a Voboam replica that I strung double on the first course and liked it.  My hunch -- double strung may have been more common pre-1700 and, perhaps because the music became more contrapuntally complex, players found the  single was better.

[John Underhill]

I always thought that the reason for a single top course was related to the difficulty of finding two thin gut strings that were matched accurately enough to be in tune over all their length.

[Monica Hall]

Interesting point.   Actually Ruiz de Ribayaz as well as Amat says that the 1st course is single in Spain and both Montesardo and Sanseverino say that the 1st course is single in Italy.   Most sources of course don't include stringing or tuning instructions which are specific about this or anything else.  I suppose the extra peg was provided in case the player wanted to use two strings on the 1st course.   This method of stringing may have been used when strumming whereas a single string is better for more elaborate music not just in the 18th century but throughout the 17th as well - in fact as soon as lute style counterpoint was added to the strumming creating a mixed style.  Playing ornaments is best on single strings. As John says it may have been difficult to get two thin strings that were in tune throughout - although this is a problem with the other courses and especally with octave strung courses.   And of course the thinner strings are more likely to break so having only one is less trouble.  I think there are quite a few illustrations showing only 9 pegs.   It may be that more examples with 10 pegs have survived to the present day.  Monica

[Bev Ross]

Thanks for the info Monica.  Subsequent to my post I re-opened the James Tyler book (The Early Guitar).  His remarks on the matter (p.26):  "Visual and written evidence confirms that  this fashion for using only a single first string was quite widespread and also extended to the 5-course guitar of the 17th and 18th centuries, even though virtually all the guitars which survive from this period were made to accommodate a double first course.  This curious anomaly is nowhere explained ... ."  Tyler suggests an explanation might be the difficulty in finding good matching strings, especially for the first course.

Unresolved mysteries for future scholars to tackle!

[Peter Forrester]

A third use - not really a reason! - is that the spare peg hole seems often to have been used for an ornamental bunch of ribbon, just occasionally as a fastening point for a strap.

[Monica Hall]

Hadn't thought of that - but the extra hole could be useful in that way!   Attached is a nice photo of a guitar by Tessler with only 9 pegs!

[Peter Forrester]

A nice looking guitar.  Is this the one with the very detailed sides and back that look almost like wicker-work?  I think the neck has been shortened during the 19th c.

[Monica Hall]

It is in the Musee de la Musique in Nice.   Yes it looks as if the neck has been shortened.   I will try to attach a photo of the back.   Of course a lot of 5-course guitars have been altered to take 6 single strings.   Just wild speculation - but I wonder whether more of those with 10 pegs have survived unaltered because they could be adapted to take 2 single strings for the 1st and 2nd courses and doubles for courses 3-6.

[Akira Sakamoto]

Hello, Monica and Peter!  Doesn't this guitar look a bit strange?  It looks like having a double first course and a single second course at the nut, but a single first and a double second at the bridge.  Also, the treble string for the fifth course starts to be right on the edge around in the middle of the neck.

I'm sorry to be off-topic, but could it be originally made as a four-course guitar, and then modified to a five-course one and crudely set up?

[Monica Hall]

I don't think it was originally a 4-course instrument.  Looking at an enlarged image of it it I think that the strings - which can't be original - have been attached to the wrong pegs in the head.

[Peter Forrester]

I haven't been able to find a good picture of the nut, however there is another photo ("Guitares", Eurydice, Paris, 1980) which shows the top course single, remainder double. So probably just a string which has become misplaced at the nut. I think there are some more guitars extant with nine pegs(?) and quite a lot of pictures - including the guitar played by Granata himself in the frontispiece to his 'Opera Quarta', 1659.  How the string windings and the pegs are arranged is a different matter!  A few apparently careful paintings (One was in the room with the Hill Collection - Sellas, Stradivari, etc - in the Ashmolean, Oxford) do show that the first and last strings especially can benefit from 'reversed' windings, and that the peg order even can be changed.  A professional would soon get used to his (or her) own guitar, and it would create a difficulty for any person trying to borrow it!

[Monica Hall]

Yes - that's true.  I have the order of the pegs and string windings  of my 5th course in reverse order.  

[Akira Sakamoto]

Thank you very much for sharing your insights.  I think this is yet another example of the difficulty of researching the stringing and the tuning of string instruments.