Various early forms of instrument with strings running along a neck, which were stopped and plucked to form notes, and with a resonating sound chamber to increase the volume, undoubtedly existed in remote antiquity. An instrument with affinities with the guitar as we know it today appears on stone reliefs from an area of Asia Minor, now in modern Turkey, dating from as far back as 1350 BC. This instrument had a body with incurved sides, a neck with frets, and a number of strings. This form of instrument was not depicted or described by the Greeks or Romans, but may have survived in the Near East until its descendant surfaced in Europe in the medieval period. An image in the Carolingian Psalters of the 9th century shows an instrument whose outline form has affinities with these ancient images. By the 13th century, church iconography and manuscripts show the precursors to renaissance and baroque guitars.

In 1 349 Duke Jehan of Normandy employed musicians who played guitars known as guiterre morische (Moorish guitar) and guitarra latina (Latin guitar). The guiterre morische was not really a guitar but an early form of lute, which later developed into both the European lute and the modern Arabic 'ud, but the guitarra latina was the direct ancestor of the modern guitar. There is much confusion over the nomenclature of these early instruments, which appeared in various forms in Spain, Italy and Southern France, and names varied according to country, social class, and repertoire, as well as type of instrument.

Johannes Tinctoris, writing in 1487, describes two separate forms of instrument -one "invented by the Spanish which both they and the Italians call the viola [vihuela in Spanish, not be confused with the modern viola]...This viola differs from the lute in that the lute is much larger and tortoise shaped, while the viola is flat and curved inwards on each side"; and the other "the instrument invented by the Catalans, which some call the guiterra and others the ghiteme... the guiterra is used most rarely because of the thinness of its sound. When I heard it in Catalonia it was being used much more often by women to accompany love songs, than by men." In Italy these two instruments were known respectively as the viola da mono and chitarra. The vihuela da mano in Spain was predominantly an instrument with six pairs, or courses, of strings and its repertoire was quite sophisticated. It co-existed with the guitarra, which was a smaller and lighter instrument with only four courses, and a limited and simpler repertoire. The instruments had similarities and there were fingerstyle and plectrum techniques. Faxardo, writing in the 16th century, states that the guitarra "won't bear the fingers but must be touched with a fine quill to make it exert its harmony."

By the 16th century, the guitar had become widespread. In 1547, Henry VIII of England had 21 guitars among his large collection of musical instruments in Hampton Court Palace, and a writer in France in 1556 states that "in my earliest years we used to play the lute more than the guitar, but for twelve or fifteen years now everyone has been guitarring." Referring to the guitar,Tobias Stimmer (1539—84) wrote "one can tell by the looks of it that it served as an introduction to the lute, for accompanying old songs, for reciting old tales, and a good many other things. We should preserve the tradition of our elders."

Vihuela music

The earliest surviving music for the vihuela comes from early 16th-century Spain, and consists of courtly dances, sets of variations and song accompaniments written for the upper levels of society. Seven manuscripts of vihuela music have survived. These collections of pieces acted as both entertainment and instruction, and the music was written using a diagrammatic notation called tablature, with numbers representing fret positions on each string and notes above showing the time values. The vihuela was originally tuned similarly to the lute, but specific vihuela tunings evolved. The composer Luis Narvaez (fl. 1530—50), in 1538, mentions tunings at different registers with bottom strings ranging from A down to D, and Juan Bermudo (c. 1510—65) gives tunings for the six courses of ADGBEA and GCFADG in 1555.

El Maestro (1535) by the Spaniard Luis Milan (1 500 1561) contains the earliest known vihuela music with pieces of varying degrees of technical difficulty, including six courtly dances known as pavanes. Alonso Mudarra's (1 508-80) Tres Libros de Musica en Cifra para Vihuela (1 546) contains a sophisticated Fantasia, a freely-composed piece based on material found throughout Europe, later appearing under the name La Folia (The Folly). The Fantasia includes sections based on a recurrent theme known as a ground bass, and the style is modeled on the playing of the contemporary harpist Ludovico. Syncopation gives it an energetic feel, and the style ranges from simple chords to complex counterpoint, and adventurous harmonies with some clashing discords.

Guitar music

With a more limited range than the vihuela,repertoire for the four-course guitar was less sopertoire. Mudarra,s tres libors also contain some oi the first music for the guitarra. There are four fantasias, a courtly pavane, and a version of 0 guardame les vacas (Mind the cows for me) based on the traditional Romanesca ground bass.

During the 1550s a number of books of music specifically for the guitar existed in France, where the instrument was widely played and well established. Collections by Guillaumc De Morlaye, Simon Gorlier, Adrian Le Roy and others contain adaptations of lute pieces, arrangements, and compositions including fantasias and courtly dances such as the pavane and galliard, and there are also song accompaniments and consort music including melodic parts for the guitar.
The vihuela de cinco ordines, a five-course guitar, also appeared around this time. The first music for this instrument was included in the 6th-century composer Miguel de Fuenllana's Orphenica Lyra (1554), which included fantasias, transcribed exerpts from a mass, and a villancico love song.

Guitar strings & tunings

Early guitars had gut strings placed in pairs, or courses, with a variety of tunings. Mudarra's four-course guitar, which had ten frets, was tuned to either FCEA or later GCEA, with the top three courses tuned in unison (the same note), and the bottom pair an ocatave apart, known as a bordon; but Bermudo states that the tuning of the four-course guitar is the same as the four middle strings of the vihuela — CFAD. There were also some "re-entrant" tunings, where the bottom course is tuned to a pitch higher than some of the other strings: for example the GDF# B tuning, where the fourth course is tuned just above the second strings. French guitar books of the ISSOs show guitars with a single top string, hence the Italian name chitarra da sette corde (seven-string.guitar), and there were also some five-course instruments.

This early guitar music was not played rigidly, and room was given for improvisation allowing for small variations and expressive ornamentation within the form.

Among early playing techniques were inegale, picking notes and melodies with the thumb and index finger, and rasgueado strumming, unfurling the fingers across the strings. There were many different levels of ability among guitarists, and pieces were aimed at different levels of society; depending on the skill of the player, techniques ranged from punteado, plucking harmonies and florid single-note passages and counterpoint, to simple strumming.

The fashion in the late 16th century for rather basic styles and a use oi rigid chord patterns for strumming prompted some criticism. The popularity of the guitar among ordinary people was lamented by the inquisitor Covarrubias writing in 1611, who complained: "but now the guitar is no more than a cowbell, so easy to play, especially rasgueado, that there is not a stable lad who is not a musician on the guitar.

Five-course tutor

Carlos y Amat's 1596 Guitarra Espanola y Vandola self-instruction book for five-course guitar uses an ADGBE tuning and shows pictures of 12 major and 12 minor chords. It advocates a simple strumming style that enables the guitarists to play dances and songs in different keys.

Belcmor dlas

Being so fragile, no totally authentic early guitars have survived. This heavily restored instrument has a label indicating that it was made by Belchior Dias in Lisbon in 1581, and is one of the only dated guitars from the 16th century. It has a small body, a vaulted back, a string length of just over 22 in (55.4 cm) and five courses.

The baroque age

During the Baroque period, from roughly 1600 to the early 1700s, the five-course guitar effectively replaced the four-course guitar and the six-course vihuela, and a standard ADGBE began to predominate, with the two lowest courses often using bourdons and sometimes creating re-entrant tunings with high notes.

The first major figure is the Italian Giovanni Paolo Foscarini. Little is known about him, but published works from 1630 show that he was bringing a new level of sophistication with a mixture of strummed and plucked styles. After him, another Italian, Francesco Corbetta (c. 1615—81), one of the foremost virtuosos of the period, traveled widely, becoming well known and highly influential. He wrote material which is often technically difficult, with complex invention and ornamentation including double trills. Among his most developed works are the chaconnes, courtly dances. Corbetta's La Guitarre Royale (1671) was dedicated to Charles II, who played the guitar. Amusingly, the diarist

Samuel Pepys wrote upon hearing Corbetta that he played admirably, yet "I was mightily troubled that so many pains were taken on so bad an instrument."
The Frenchman Robert de Visee (c. 1660—1720) studied with Corbetta, and produced suites in his Livre de Guitarre (1682) and Livre de Pieces (1686).

The Spanish guitarist and composer Caspar Sanz (1640- 1710) was influenced by Italian music and thought Corbetta "the best of all." He published Instruction de Musica Sobra la Guitarra Espanola (1674), and wrote passacalles, preludes, and pavannes; and among his works are the attractive Canarios melodies. During the 17th century, music with a continuo role for the guitar was in widespread use where the player has a bass part from which he can improvise voicings to lay down a harmonic part in songs and ensemble pieces.

Toward the end of the 17th century William Turner, writing in 1697, could say that "the fine easie ghittar, whose performance is soon gained, at least after the brushing way, hath at this time overtopt the nobler lute" and "nor is it to be denied that after the pinching way the ghittar makes some good work."

The 1700s

In the 18th century, many changes took place with the invention of the piano and the advent of the classical era, and there are few serious written works. Paintings by French artist Antoine Watteau (1684—1721) reflect one aspect of the guitar in society as an instrument for the amorous or frivolous.
A German writer in 1713 says "the flat guitar with its strum, strum we shall happily leave to the garlic-eating Spaniards . Yet the Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757), of whom it was said "surely no composer ever fell more deeply under its spell," has Spanish guitar influences reflected in his harpsichord compositions. The guitar was still popular and published works are often light song accompaniments. After the French Revolution of 1789, among the property confiscated from the aristocracy by the Committee for Public Safety were dozens of guitars.

The guitar in transition

During the mid-1700s, there was a gradual move to adding a lower string, tuned to E, to the five-course guitar, giving a standard tuning of EADGBE. Books started to appear for six-course instruments with this tuning, including Antonio Ballestero's Obra para Guitarra de Seis Ordenes (Worksfor the six-course guitar) in 1780. Modern stave notation started to replace the old tablature, and one of the first to use this exclusively was Michel Corrette's Les Dons d'Apollon (1763). Toward the end of the 18th century, the Spanish monk Padre Basilio in Madrid composed six-string music for guitar and one of his pupils, Federico Moretti, wrote The Principles of Playing the Guitar with Six Strings (1799).

Guitar developments

During the 1780s across Europe, there was a trend toward making guitars with six single strings led by the Italians and French with small pockets of change in other countries. Many Spanish makers, however, continued to produce six-course instruments, and this stringing system was not fully eclipsed by the six single strings until the 1830s. Music for six single strings was being produced by the 1790s. Ferdinando Carulli (1770-1841) was born in Naples and he developed his playing technique at a time when six-single-string instruments were firmly established in the He was one of the figures who played a part in the resurgence of the guitar, and developed his own approaches to technique which formed the basis of his studies and compositions, that he published a number of years later after he moved to Paris.

Fabricatore

This instrument made by Giovanni Battista Fabricatore in Naples in 1793 has six single strings. He was consistently making instruments of this type from the 1780s onward; other Neapolitan makers were also producing instruments with six single strings city.