> The thing is, when a lute stops being a musician's working tool (e.g. the > musician dies or gets a new lute) it becomes a piece of junk that's too > much trouble to take care of.
This is probably part of the true answer. Because of the lute's decline in popularity, inheritors of lutes may not have been able to sell them to pawnshops, secondhand music stores, or acquaintances, even though they originally cost 1-4 months' wages.
