Dear all,
Two weeks ago I spent some good times with a Cretan group who was on tour in
Corsica. They played many Cretan and Greek flutes, Laouto (Cretan
wire-strung lute similar to italian mandoloncello), Bulgari (built by ning
member Dimitris Rapakousios), Lavta (Constantinople Lute, more or less
fretted arabic oud to explain it simply) etc etc...
The plucked instruments player from Crete, Vangelis Tsagarakis, told me a
very interesting thing : A long, long time ago Crete also had the "cetra".
He told me that because I had my cetera with me and he said that they used
to have exactly the same instrument on the island of Crete. I was wondering
if they used to have the same 8 course cittern or the renaissance 4 or 6
course cittern, popular in Italy and Europe during the Renaissance and
after. He told me that the cetra in Crete probably had 4 courses.
So I have my own idea about this without any information nor sources except
this oral one.
Candia (the old name for Crete) was administrated, colonised and directed by
the Venitian Republic after the taking of Constantinople by the crusaders
from 1204 to 1669. The Venitian Republic held Crete for about 4 and a half
centuries.
I think that the cittern was in Crete because of this strong Italian
influence.
Does anybody have any information, sources or anything to say about this?
Thanks,
Damien
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