Page:The Music of India.djvu/137

 in the north, and at Tanjore in the south; and many of them are most elaborately ornamented with ivory. No Indian orchestra is complete without the tambur.

There is a variety of the tambur called the Brahma Vina. This is made like a large box and has no gourd or bowl. It is about three and a half feet long and six inches wide and stands nine inches high. There is a raised ledge in the middle, over which the strings run; and it has a fifth string at the side tuned to the higher Sa (c^). It is used for the same purpose as the tambur.

Sometimes players use the tambur in quite peculiar ways. I once heard a musician play on it by stopping the strings with a small bamboo and using it more like the vina. The full resonance of the tambur and the buzzing sound gave the melody a very pleasing effect. I also heard a performer play an instrument like the tambur by stopping it with a cocoanut. The name given to this instrument by the people is Kottuvadyam or Balasarasvati. The word kottu is said to mean 'movable fret.' It is found in a few places in South India.

The Sursota is another variety of the tambur found in the north. It has no gourd or bowl and is really a hollow trunk of bamboo. It is about three feet long and has four strings tuned similarly to the tambur.

The Kinnari is one of the primitive Indian instruments. It is supposed to have been invented by Kinnara, one of the musicians of Indra's heaven, after whom a class of musicians has been named. The instrument to-day is a beggar's instrument only. It is strange that the Bible also mentions a stringed instrument called the Kinnor, and it is possible that these may have had some connection with each other. We find the Kinnari represented on many old Indian sculptures and paintings.

It is made from a piece of bamboo or blackwood, about two and a half feet long, fixed upon three gourds. There are twelve frets made of bone or metal and fixed upon the fingerboard by some resinous substance. The strings pass into a tall perpendicular peg near the last of the frets. The tailpiece of the instrument is often made to represent the tail of a kite. There are two or three strings, one