Greetings, I could be wrong but from the context it appears to me that Pedro Calderia Cabral made a simple typographical error in the first sentence, I believe he meant to type violão instead of simply viola. With this change his statements make sense to me. I hope Pedro will confirm this matter for the rest of the readers. In any case, I thank him for his further contribution to this discussion.
The affix "ão" is a common augmentative in Portuguese which, in this situation seems to add the meaning of large or grand. Thus, the violão is understood as a large or grand viola. The diacritcal mark over the letter "a" is called a til in Portuguese, it indicates the nasalization of the sound. For the information of non-Portuguese speakers I should mention that the singular form of this word is violão while the plural form is violões. In my experience with native speakers of Portuguese who know something about instruments, I find that the folkloric instruments such as the viola da terra, viola campaniça, viola braguesa, viola toeira, etc. are referred to as violas (plural for viola)--but never violões (plural for violão). In contrast, the Spanish classical guitar (sometimes called the viola francesa or even as guitarra clássical), and the viola de fado are variantly referred to as either violas or violões. For clarity, I try to maintain this distinction between the viola and violão, but I think it is important to mention in this discussion of nomeclature that this distinction between viola and violão is not always observed. I should mention here that purists do not like to hear the term guitarra used in Portuguese for the violão, yet nevertheless, the term is sometimes heard or seen. In his little self published book, Os Sons e os Tons da Música Popular Portuguesa (not dated but published within the last 10 years), José Lucio mentions that the term violão is used to refer to the viola francesa or the guitarra clássica (p. 20). In this discussion of nomeclature it is important to realize that the meaning of words changes over time and from context to context. Ron Fernández Ron Fernandez Frank Nordberg wrote: >Pedro Caldeira Cabral sent me this reply to my wild Portuguese guitar >theories and asked me to forward it to the list. > >Frank > >--- > >Pedro Caldeira Cabral wrote: > >Some clariffying remarks: > >The word VIOLA in portuguese only appeared in the late 19th and was >applied to a precise instrument: a large guitar with six or seven >stopped strings and a variable number of extra bass strings up to four. >The word VIOLA is used in portuguese since the 13th century to designate >all eight shaped chordophones, no matter of them being plucked or bowed. >In the 16th century in Portugal sometimes we find the reference to the >VIOLA DE ARCO meaning most of the times a Viol (da Gamba). >In castillian language the distinction between GUITARRA and VIHUELA was >described by many authors, among them Bermudo in 1555, who also >explained the different tunings. >At the same time in Portugal we used to name VIOLA de QUATRO ORDENS, ou >VIOLA DE CINCO ORDENS, what the castillians named as GUITARRA.Is this clear? >The 2 best surviving examples of this type of instrument from the late >16th were made in Lisbon/Portugal , made by Belchior Dias and currently >in the Royal College of Music, London and Shrine to the Music Museum, >South Dakota, USA. >There is also a VIOLA DE SEIS ORDENS in the Paris Musèe de la Musique, >wich was found and bought by Madame la Contesse de Chambure in Lisboa in >1960.It closely resembles the instruments from Dias workshop. > >As to the sources in Portugal: > >4 instruments survived from the 18 th century (to my knowledge) and >their close examen was done by me allowing me to produce some of my >conclusions. >My main conclusion is that we have from the 16th onwards a continuous >tradition of making and playing the Citara (Cittern) wich evolved from >the renaissance carved models to the paralel deep sided type and flat >pegbox with wood pegs inserted from rear side of the instruments as J.P >dos Reis, Lisboa 1764, entirelly made of Pine (Pinus sylvestris), Joao >Correa de Almeida , Lisboa 1776, made of Sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus), >and 2 non-signed instruments one of them restored in Coimbra in 1807 >with added head of the Preston type. >By the way, I never said or even thought of the Guitarra Portuguesa >being the mother of the English Guitar. >As to the tuning mechanism used in the portuguese guitar: it is a late >portuguese re-design (c.1870) of the so-called Preston system, who >indeed never registered its patent. >Other evidence of this double practice is the numerous references in >portuguese literature and reports of foreign visitors (R.Southey, >W.Beckford, J.Murphy, etc.) who refer the status of the Guitarra, being >on fashion among the ladies of the best society. >At the same time we have references as to the Citara status: It was >usually found in barbershops, in taverns and among coloured people and >prostitutes. >Quoting M.Morais: "the oldest reference I found of the word Guitarra in >a specific musical context was this: António Cardoso-Guitarra, Ilário >Gomes-Viola" inscribed in the brotherhood of St.Cecília in 1720. >Can we draw any relevant conclusion out of this? >I prefer to keep on examining real instruments (I have complete detailed >measurements of over 150 PGs in my files) along with iconographic evidence. >Please send this to those on the list.Thank you in advance. > >Best regards. > > >Pedro Caldeira Cabral > > > >To get on or off this list see list information at >http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > > > --
