The Probert Encyclopaedia of Music

LUTE

The lute is a family of stringed musical instruments that were in use during the 14th to 18th centuries. The lute had a pear-shaped convex back built up of staves of various kinds of wood, a flat breast - usually of pine - a bridge, a fretted finger-board, and strings tuned in pairs of unisons and from one to three sound holes in the breast. Lutes were played by plucking the strings with the thumb and fingers.
Research Lute