Within the past few months I have attended a couple of "early music" concerts at which a prominent part was played by a theorbo.
This is essentially a long-necked lute, with two sets of strings, one set fingered, the other, longer ones (called diapasons), tuned to a single note in a lower register.
What I'm interested in is the origin of the name. The only other instruments in current use whose names end in "o" are "piccolo" and "oboe", and I know or can find the etymology of those names. I have the suspicion that the name "theorbo" would have been "modernized" if the instrument itself had remained in fashion.
theorbo
- Slava
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Re: theorbo
According to dictionary.com:
1595–1605; <Italian teorba, variant of tiorba, special use of Venetian tiorba, variant of tuorba traveling bag ≪ Turkish torba bag; so called from the bag it was carried in
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Re: theorbo
Thank you, Slava. It would have to be a pretty big bag. The instrument isn't quite as bulky as a double bass, but it's at least somewhat longer. One of the instruments used at the concerts I attended was taller than the musician playing it, and he wasn't exactly short.
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Re: theorbo
It would be hard job for me to work this word up, because (1) no one knows where it came from (beyond Italian) and (2) the limited range of its meaning prevents any figurative uses. Slava has given you what history we know.
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