Plucked Psaltery & Plucked Psaltery Kit

[more about the Plucked Psaltery]


	Plucked Psaltery in the Cantigas of Santa Maria

En: Plucked Psaltery, Hog-nose Psaltery, Es: Dulcema, Fr: Hachoir, De: Hackbrett, It: Salterio tedesco, Heb: Psantir

The psaltery (the name coming from the Greek word 'Psalterion') probably filtered into Europe from the Near East during the crusades.

Dating back about 3000 years, it was first played in Greece and the Middle East and its basic design - a hollow sound box with resonating strings stretched across it - was the basis for a very wide family of zithers, autoharps and hammered dulcimers.

Illustrations dating from the 12th century onwards depict the instrument in many different forms but the most popular throughout Europe during the Middle Ages is a trapezoidal shape with in curved sides, often called a 'snout-nosed' or "pig-snout" psaltery.

Each string on this type of psaltery is plucked either with the player's fingernails or with a plectrum. The strings on the earliest psalteries were made from gut, but later steel-stringed psalteries make a louder, brighter sound.


	RWC Finished and Kit Plucked Psaltery

RWC Plucked Psaltery
We have kept to the traditional trapezoidal shape with in-curved sides, often called a 'snout-nosed' psaltery, for our Plucked Psaltery.

Each instrument is hand built to special order in our own workshops in Toledo (Spain) and comes with 12 months warranty.

Swiss pine on an English sycamore framework is hand finished and then strung in brass to ensure a full tone from the instrument.

Tuned to a diatonic scale of three octaves G - a" it is most commonly played resting on the lap with a quill.

Each instrument comes complete with a tuning lever and 12 month warranty.

A soft carrying case is available as optional extra.


	RWC Finished and Kit Plucked Psaltery

Plucked Psaltery Kit
The same instrument is offered in kit form for home assembly.

The price includes the license to build one instrument for private use.

All the main constructional parts are supplied cut to size from traditional timbers and are ready for final assembly working to the template provided. The template also shows the builder where to drill the holes for the hitch pins and tuning pins and where to fit the correct gauges of brass wire. The instruction manual adopts a 'step by step' approach to guide the builder through each stage of construction explains how to tune and play the instrument to a diatonic scale of three octaves G - a".

All the kits Include free access to our customer 'Helpline' should you need any advice on construction, setting-up or playing.

A soft padded case is available as an optional extra if required. Please ask for details.


	RWC Finished and Kit Plucked Psaltery

Plucked Psaltery Plan
You can make the same instrument from scratch, following the detailed and fully dimensioned drawing.

The price includes the license to build one instrument for private use.

Availability and delivery time

Not all of the items listed on our site are available immediately. Products without a reference nor a price are rarely available for quick dispatch. If you are interested in them, please contact us.

We publish standard availability, which means that this product usually ships in that time since it has been ordered. But at the specific time of your order, that interval can be longer or smaller depending on many production factors. In addition, you still will have to wait for your product to arrive (delivery time). [More info about availability & delivery dates]

	Finished Instrument		Three months
	Kit		Three weeks
	Drawing		Three days