Reconsidering North African lutes: ʻūds and kwītras in La Musique Arabe dans le Maghreb

This chapter explores North African lutes in Jules Rouanet’s La musique arabe dans le Maghreb (Rouanet, 1922, p. 2829, 2920, 2927). A close reading of Rouanet shows a way of approaching North African organology that is distinct from the post-Cairo Congress consensus. In particular, it draws attention to the fuzzy boundaries between ʻūds,  ʻūd ‘arbī, and kwītra. These fuzzy boundaries are visible in the pre-Cairo Congress literature, and in fact these fuzzy boundaries are still visible in the everyday language of musicians in the Maghrib today. The way I am going to do this is through examination of a particular instrument in the Brussels Museum; in essence, I am going to “read” this instrument alongside Rouanet’s writing and those of some of his predecessors. Not only does this allow me to draw attention to fuzzy boundaries, but it also allows me to underline the Africanness of certain Maghribi instruments that are typically thought about as part of the ʻūd family. In the following pages, my argument is also illustrated through the tuning features of North African ʻūds, of which their specific combinations of intervals are crucial to local African use.

North African ʻūds were collected in the 19^th century in London (1867), Paris (1873), Berlin (1894) and Brussels (1878, 1896) (Morra, 2021). Much earlier, in the 18^th century, Thomas Shaw, attests the presence of ʻūds in the “Barbary states”: «they have the ouds, or bass double stringed lute, bigger than our viol, that is touched with a plectrum, besides several smaller gittar (or quetaras, according to their pronunciation), of different size, each of them tuned an octave higher than another [italics by Shaw] » (Shaw, 1757, p. 203). Some years earlier than Rouanet’s publication, a significant event concerning the instrument was documented at the beginning of the 20th century. Erich Von Hornbostel, an Austrian comparative music scholar, recorded a ʻūd in Berlin in March 1904 during a performance by a visiting Tunisian group. According to Hornbostel's description (1906), the ʻūd played in that ensemble by Daidou Msīka resembles the Tunisian model: "Die Darbouka, die Msīka Laute begleitete, war auf Fis gestimmt, also eine Oktave unter der tiefsten Lautensaite". The Darbouka, which accompanied Msiqa's lute, was tuned on F-sharp1, i.e., an octave below the lowest string of the lute (Hornbostel, 1906, p. 4; Katz, 1975, p. 329). Taking into account this tuning description, which is the Tunisian ʻūd today transposed a major 3rd (D2, D3, G2, C3), could we assume that this instrument type was used to make that recording in Berlin? Is it the kind of ʻūd that Rouanet described? Or one of those that are preserved in museums?

To make things more complicated, at the beginning of 20^th century, there was widespread confusion in terms of nomenclature for these types of musical instruments. In Kashf al-qināʻ ʻan alāt al-samāʻ, Ghouti Bouali reports that the instrument called kwitra in Algeria (1904, p. 102) is instead called ʻūd in Morocco and in Egypt. Bouali also gives the tuning of the kwitra (C, A, D, G), which oddly correspond to today’s tuning of the ʻūds in Algeria. In The Music and Musical Instruments of the Arabs, Francisco Salvador-Daniel (1914) reports that of all the instruments, the most commonly used in Algeria was the kouitra, known in that region as the «Tunisian guitar - the shape, together with the name, recalling, the cithara of the Greeks» (Daniel, 1914, p. 61). A kouitra, which is not present in Tunisia – as far as we know – from the start of the 20^th century, named a “Tunisian guitar”? In the book’s preface, H. G. Farmer adds a note on the physical description of the instrument: «[it] is smaller [than the oriental oud], has no frets, and the head instead of being turned at a right angle is almost straight» (Farmer, quoted in Daniel, 1914, p. 239). Farmer agrees with Shaw in distinguishing North African lutes as being smaller than “oriental” ones. In this context, eight years later, Rouanet describes in detail, as we will see, an instrument named kwītra as being the favourite plucked instrument among musicians of North Africa (Rouanet, 1922, p. 2926). Rouanet’s taxonomy of North African lutes is akin to their earlier classification by Mahillon (1841–1924) and Engel (1874). Since Carl Engels’ studies and especially Victor-Charles Mahillon’s (1880) first systematic scheme of instrument classification, later expanded by Hornbostel and Sachs, the ‘ūd has been classified among stringed instruments of the Middle East. Similarly, Rouanet groups lutes (kwītra and oud, including qanun) under the description of «plucked instruments (with a plectrum) » (instruments à plectre) (1922, p. 2926). In terms of general classification, according to Rouanet: «the kwītra has a Maghrebian origin»: «il parait d’ailleurs avoir une origine maghrébine ou hispano mauresque » (1922, p. 2926), and the ʻūd was described as an instrument of the Arabs (1922, p. 2927).

A decade later, in 1934, Domingo Prat, in his Diccionario de Guitarristas, mentions a kouitra as an Arab guitar, also called “guitarra de Tứnez” (Tunisian guitar) (Prat, 1934, p. 411). The connections and exchanges between naming the instruments according to their geographical provenience and forms are common for organological classification. What is at stake here is that, in examining various cultural and identity interrelations between the North African plucked instruments of ʻūd types, both ʻūd and kwītra raise ambiguity when it comes to definitions, since they draw attention to a seemingly unapproachable morass of historical facts, cultural identity formation and intertwined relationships involving both public and private music making.

A shift to modern nomenclature concerning the North African lutes began at the Cairo Congress of 1932, when the instrument was played for the Tunisian and Algerian delegations, respectively by Khamaīs Tarnane and Omar Bekhchi, to represent a typical musical instrument of the North African mālūf ensembles (Guettat, 1992, p. 71; Bouzar-Kasabdji, 1992, p. 92). Thereafter, the distinction between the kwītra and the ʻūd ʻarbī was to become sharper, although a certain ambiguity remains: Jurgen Elsner identifies the four-stringed kwītra or ʻūd ʻarbī as being characteristic of the 20th century Algerian ensemble (Elsner, 1992, p. 193). During the same period, Rezgui couples the instrument name with the adjective "Tunisian": ʻūd tūnsī (Rezgui, 1989, p. 58). Later, both Scheherazade Hassan and Maya Saidani report that the ʻūd ‘arbī is mainly used in the Algerian the city of Constantine (Saidani, 2006, p. 182), and in Tunisia, where it is also known as ʻūd tūnsī (Ḥassan, 2002, p. 406). For them, the kwītra is another regional shortnecked lute used only in Arab Andalusian urban ensembles in Morocco and Algeria (Ḥassan, 2002, p. 407; Saidani, 2006, p. 182). Recently, at the symposium on “Musical Traditions in North Africa” in Sidi Bou Said (Tunisia, December 2014), the Tunisian Saifallah Ben Abderrazak maintained that the ʻūd ‘arbī (also called ʻūd maghribī) is the same instrument in Tunisia and Morocco, but in the latter, it goes by the name of ʻūd ramal. The kwītra (pl. kyātir) instead is an instrument used essentially in Algeria but very similar to the ʻūd ‘arbī. Today, both the terms ʻūd tūnsī and ʻūd ‘arbī are in use, though with a slight preference for the former also in academic contexts. The instruments tend to figure in historical terms, although the present-day Tunisian ʻūd and Algerian kwītra are relatively stable and uniform objects.

Today, the ʻūd (often spelt oud, sometimes named in museum classification also kouitra, kwītra, quwaytara), a plucked instrument, is the most prominent musical instrument of the Arab-Islamic world. A recognised standard Arab/Egyptian model (ʻūd sharqī, oriental ʻūd, also called ʻūd miṣrī, Egyptian) is the most used type along with the Turkish one, whereas models from Iran, Greece, Iraq and Syria are also variously found. In North Africa, several practices and styles of ʻūd co-exist, namely Tunisian, Algerian, and Moroccan. The ʻūd ‘arbī and the kwītra are four double-course necked instruments. It consists of a sound chest made of a series of ribs, linked to a flat front surface of wood, and pierced by sound holes, near which a membrane made of shell and wood protects the belly from the strokes of the plectrum. Its shape differs from the standard Egyptian model, as does the tuning according to different regional traditions.

Comparison between Rouanet’s and Mahillon’s Kwītras

The section about musical instruments of La musique arabe dans le Maghreb follows the part about melodic forms of instrumental music
(1922, p. 2894), and the musical examples of the repertoires. Rouanet mentions the kwītra among the musical instruments of profane music in public spaces, but there is no reference to the ʻūd (1922, p. 2829). It appears rather strange that the kwītra is not used in private music gatherings, feasts, weddings etc. In the 1920s, according to Rouanet, the kwītra was the “preferred” musical instrument for North African musicians, and presumably I might say, it was spread across Algeria rather than Tunisia. Today, the kwītra is indeed a typically Algerian traditional instrument. It is mostly played in the regions of Algiers and Tlemcen. In the region of Constantine, it is replaced by the ʻūd ‘arbī (a point to which we will return), and is typically part of the ensemble which performs the nūba.

The idea and imagery of the kwītra being a guitar is very much present in Rouanet’s writing too. «The kwītra is a guitar» (p. 2926) is a peculiar statement by Rouanet, which differentiates its form from the ʻūd. From the instrument description and the drawing, the contrary is apparent since the kwītra is an instrument akin to the ʻūd, as we see from Rouanet’s successive description. The kwītra is made, in principle, of nine or ten ribs, as Rouanet attests. Each rib is cut to a mould, and the wood used, according to Rouanet, namely pear, walnut, chestnut and maple, coincide with today’s practice. The body of the kwītra is much smaller and shallower than that of the eastern ʻūd. The kwītra’s rosette, which differentiates it from the North African ʻūds and the oriental ʻūd, is shaped like an ace of spades or a «tree of life»; for Rouanet it is a flower vase, a particularly Hispano-Mauresque style (1922, p. 2926). The rosette is cut directly from the table and is not attached to the other piece of wood. According to Rouanet, the soundboard is made up of parts, it is not one solid piece, and this is the case for all North African lute construction. Around the soundboard, on the ribs, a strip of leather is attached, glued to strengthen the body with the face, against shocks to the ribs of the instrument which risk cracking and weakening the corners. The leather band is also explained by Rouanet for its practical use: the kwītra does not have a protection plate (raqma) as the ʻūds have.

The strings go from the peg to the bridge which is glued to the soundboard. This bridge has a special form in the kwītra and in the Maghrebian ʻūd in general: the form of a moustache. Rouanet emphasises this peculiar moustache shape in a detailed drawing that highlights his deep knowledge of the parts of the instrument. However, Rouanet misses the most important organology feature that distinguishes the North African lute from the eastern oud, namely the length of the neck. North African lutes have a longer neck than eastern ones - for the kwītra, as for the ‘ūd ‘arbī, the note produced at the intersection of the body and the neck should be, at an interval of sixth major (5/3 ratio) in relation to the note emitted by the open string. By comparison, in the eastern ʻūd, the intersection is at the perfect fifth (3/2). At the end of this handle, we find the peg, which does not have a right angle as for the eastern ʻūd, but a much less accentuated angle noted by Rouanet.

Very much importance is given by Rouanet to the plectrum to strike the strings, through a figure and a detailed description (1922, p. 2926). As musicians reported, the plectrum used for kwītra is an eagle feather. This feather is stripped of its horny tip and beards. The spine is then cut longitudinally in half from a certain length, and only one of the resulting parts is kept. The feather is pre-soaked for about 48 hours in oil to make it more supple. The part of the spine thus softened is very delicately folded back into a pin. Finally, the two ends are tied with thread and allowed to dry, as is drawn on the page. The plectrum and other detailed drawings in Rouanet’s pages resemble the instrument and objects used nowadays.

In historical terms, the instruments I wish to compare with Rouanet’s description arrived at the Musée Instrumental of the Conservatoire Royal de Musique de Bruxelles in the 19^th century - among other instruments - all of which were labelled kouitara by the curator and collector Victor- Charles Mahillon (1841-1924). These instruments have common features with the kwītra of Rouanet, but also nomenclature issues. Mahillon was appointed curator of the Musical Instruments Museum at the Brussels Conservatory on February 1^st, 1877 (De Keyser, 2006, p. 5). These African ʻūds possibly came to Europe in three important sub-collections along with Chinese instruments from several gifts. L.J.F.E. von Ende, a captain in the East Indies Army, donated mainly Indonesian instruments in 1879 and the engineer Auguste Herpin in Cairo donated a collection of 52 instruments from the Maghreb countries between 1879 and 1880. Further, Vermandele donated a further 27 African instruments (De Keyser, 2006, p. 17). In particular, at the Paris World Fair in 1878, Mahillon bought 27 instruments for the museum of instruments, from the Maghreb countries, Persia (Iran), Egypt, Central Africa, Siam (Thailand), China, Peru, New Caledonia, Java and from the lands of the North American Indians, among which a kouiṭāra from Tunisia 0395 (De Keyser, 2006, p. 69). Mahillon noted that two instruments were from Tunisia 0395 (1878), 0877 (1896), one from Morocco 0392 (1878), and two from Algeria 0393, 0394 (Mahillon, 1978, p. 298). These instruments have a number of features connecting them specifically to North African ʻūds , only two of which are recognised today as being kouitras (0393, 0394). The remainder can be defined as Tunisian ūd ‘arbī (0395, 0877), and Moroccan ūd ramal (0392), maintaining their geographical provenance attributed by Mahillon. Mahillon corresponded with his colleagues, curators such as Carl Engel in London, building up an information network that broadened with his growing international reputation. Mahillon often copied Engels in terms of nomenclature for extra-European instruments, though in this case he differed, defining the instrument as kouitaras (1978, p. 3). The name kouitara instead must have been used widely in North Africa in the 19^th century during exchanges with collectors and musicians, although its affiliation to a particular instrument might have occurred in the 20^th century and specifically from Rouanet onwards (1922).

In this respect, in the second edition catalogue (1893), on the kouitara 0392’s accompanying notes with pictures, its tuning is written in G clef notation. Information is given on how the strings are stroked and what material they are made of ([1978, p. 298). Instead, in the Écho musical (Brussels), a periodical launched on Mahillon’s initiative, which began publication in 1876 and ran with some interruptions until 1897, the kouitara 0392 from Morocco was described as an ūd:

The King has just given new proof of the high protection with which he honours the Museum of the Conservatory. S.M. offered the Museum a collection of African instruments, one of the most remarkable in Europe. It consists of twelve [fourteen!] specimens, extremely interesting and some of which are highly rare. Here is the list: ... Eoud (Morocco), small lute, four double strings. (Écho musical, 1878, p. 7-12)

In the same periodical, the kouitara 0395 from Tunisia was confirmed as such: «the gathering of the instruments of all peoples, at the Universal Exhibition of Paris [1878], has allowed the museum to make the following acquisitions ... A Kuitra, a kind of guitar with 4 double strings, used among the Jewish population from Tunisia» (Écho musical, 1878, p. 7-12).

The names and the description of the instruments raise intriguing questions about their use and provenance. It is plausible that Mahillon either bought it from a display or directly from the musicians present there. However, the presence of small, plucked instruments is attested also by Rouanet. Besides the kwītra, he describes smaller ones as such: el-qrineda or el-qrinʻa, being present especially in urban Moorish spaces in North Africa (1922, p. 2927).

Figure 1 Rouanet’s Kwitra Figure 2 Kwitra 0349

Among those instruments preserved in the MIM museum, the kwītra 0349 reveals important information about Rouanet’s text (see figure 1 and 2). It has a face over which a floral designed rosette is engraved directly into the wood and onto which a moustache shaped bridge is attached, and it has a leather edge cover. In terms of its design, the instrument 0349 does not differ from the model in La Musique Arabe by Rouanet, indeed, its close resemblance is the issue here. The proportions of the body (length 417mm), the neck (260mm) and diapason (598mm) make a standard form. Nine ribs, about 43mm wide, make the shell with a depth of 155mm. A strip of wood around the edge of the body is also present as in Rouanet’s drawing. A flower-shaped rosette is carved directly out of the soundboard, with a diameter of 150mm (not really a diameter but widest points). The rosette pattern is the one named el bernous as for the Rouanet’s kwītra. The bridge, measuring 180mm in length, is moustache shaped, glued directly onto the face, and only made of wood. This moustache design is the most common trend in North African lutes, especially Algerian ones (Christianowitsch, 1863). The style is characteristic of Algerian kwītra acquired by the Cité de la Musique in Paris (1873) in 1995 (Houssay and Früh, 2012). There is no pickguard to protect the surface from plectrum strokes. The neck, made perhaps of rosewood, is inset with pieces of animal bone. It joins the body three-fifths along the length of the string. The headstock is probably made of walnut, carved out of only one piece of wood. It is 200mm long on the top side and 210mm on the back. The pegbox houses eight simple bone pegs. The pegs are probably made of rosewood. A similar peg design is identified in Rouanet’s image. This comparison suggests that this type of ʻūd belonged to people who played it in the area of Algeria and Tunisia (the Barbary States), here sharing common features due to their geographical proximity.

The ʻūd according to Rouanet

The entry after the kwītra in the dictionary by Rouanet is the term: ʻoud, «the kwītra deriving from it (especially in terms of dimensions) »
(1922, p. 2927). According to Rouanet, the kwītra resembles the oud, the Arab lute, which is not used anymore and is therefore replaced by it: «ou trouve quelques luths au Maroc, dans l’Algérie orientale et à Tunis; mais on ne trouve presque plus de luthistes». Although Rouanet points out material and structural features such as the headstock angle and the shorter neck – the instrument more closely resembling ʻūds today - the clear-cut division between oriental (Egyptian ʻūds) and ʻūds ʻarbī which will be presented a few years later at the Cairo Congress 1932 is not evident. In the 20th century, Algeria had a prolific ʻūd and kwītra making scene and the ʻūd had experienced a significant use and development throughout North Africa. In an interview during the mālūf festival of Sfax in 2017, Cheikh Salim Fergani recalled several names of makers belonging to that period such as: Ben Cheikh Lefgoune, Raḥmin Guenassia and, Benelbedjaoui. Today, as indicated by the Algerian players Salim Dada, Salim Fergani and Badreddine Guettaf who I interviewed,^[2] Algerians buy ʻūds ʻarbī from Tunisian makers, as there are few surviving local makers in their cities such as Nifer Jamel in Algiers. The presence of Algerian musicians in Tunisia during my doctoral research (2015-2017) attests to a mutual exchange of music culture between the two related musical traditions. Several times, the Tunisian scholar Mahmoud Guettat has analysed the relations of tuning systems between the North African and the eastern ones (Guettat, 1980, 2006, 2014), treating the Algerian tuning pattern as a variant of the others (Guettat, 2014, p. 14).

In the preceding essay, La Musique Arabe, which is focused on medieval sources, Rouanet explores questions of tuning, string names (bamm, mathlath, mathna, zir, ḥādd), fingering on the neck of the instrument, recognising the importance of incorporating the instrument into a broader Arab ʻūd milieu, comparing features with other models in medieval manuscripts. He usefully details the importance, since roughly the 14^th century, of historical evidence concerning music intervals and instrument making. Rouanet gives an overview of the existing theories of mathematical calculation of tetrachords and ʻūd fingering from Kitab al-aghani, the Zalzal’s index to al-Farabi, providing analysis and descriptions of fret distances (Zalzal, Persane and diatonique) in detail (Rouanet, p. 2712-2715).

Similarly, the section about the plucked instruments (Rouanet, p. 2785-2786) explores in more detail the many types of existing ʻūd in the Arab world. Quoting Kāmil al-Khulaʻī,^[3] Rouanet questions, in terms of organology, how and in what ways the Egyptian ʻūd differs from the other models through its modern tuning and measurements. Despite its generality, this work provides useful tables of comparisons of measurements of a substantial number of tetrachords, modal variations and tunings, which correspond to modern practice in the Mashreq.

Tuning as a crucial feature

The tuning of the North African ʻūds consists of a fourth interval between the first and second strings, and a fifth, between the third and fourth strings. This combination of intervals places the highest pitch string (cantino) in the middle of the other three, often described as an “embraced” string position. Practically, the cantino is the third string rather than the first string, making it an internal tuning. It has raised questions for many musicologists regarding its provenance. The kwītra has a much lower tone than the other North African ʻūds. Rouanet opts for the most common convention, which consists in designating the highest string as the first string. Thus, for the kwîtra: D is the first string, A is the second string, E is the third string, G is the fourth string, and it corresponds exactly to the instrument’s modern tuning. Rouanet does not mention the Arabic name of the strings, rather the actual notes. The "Maghrebian ‘ūd" tuning is an embraced tuning with a ratio of seconds between the fourth dhīl string and the second māya string, and between the third ḥsīn string and the first ramal string. The intervals are an upper sixth major ratio between the fourth string dhīl and the third string ḥsīn, a lower perfect fifth ratio between the third string ḥsīn and the second string māya, and a fourth ratio between the second māya string and the first ramal string. Rouanet highlights this peculiar tuning, its difficulties with regard to the fingering on the neck and the 5^th interval. In this respect, he details the fingering on the instrument’s neck, and gives information about the function of the tuning of the 4^th string. In describing the ‘ūd, a variety of tunings of six double courses of strings from Tlemcen, Morocco and Tunis are given (from the first to the sixth string): A, E, B, D, A, G, and A, E, C, G, D, A. Some tunings are ambiguous in terms of intervals among the open strings, and they are not attested anywhere else and neither do we know where they come from in terms of musical practices and genres. 

What was known at the time of Rouanet about the tuning of the North African ʻūds is that it consists of a fourth interval between the first and second strings, either C-G as a practice in Tunisia, G-D used in Algeria (Constantine) or D-A in Morocco, and a fifth, between the third and fourth strings (Guettat, 2000, p. 334). Several Algerian players such as Guettaf and Righī have confirmed to me that the note C is often tuned into A, forming an octave between the 3^rd and 4^th strings, which is a constant and uniquely Tunisian feature (d 3^rd, D 4^th) among those Maghrebian tuning patterns. This octave interval is central to my argument here, which touches on other local factors embedded in its African context.

The intersecting relation between the West African lutes and North African ʻūds has been argued by the Tunisian scholar Zouheir Gouja (2014, p. 73-75), who compared several instruments’ tunings across North African plucked instruments, such as gumbrī, ʻūd ʻarbī etc., outlining how the octave interval is present in all of them. If the first string of the ʻūd ʻarbī C is taken out and the remaining strings are compared to the three strings of the gumbrī, for example, the G-d-D intervals sequence is the same. What is more important, and what characterises these instruments and North African tunings is the position of the highest pitched string among the other strings. This feature, already attested by Rouanet for the kwītra, definitely distinguishes a diverse tuning practice from eastern ʻūd models (from modern Egypt to Iraq), marking a watershed within the use of ʻūd ʻarbī versus ʻūd sharqī. A specific characteristic of the former is its tuning, by which the unusual position of the "melodic" (cantino) results in this peculiar aspect of the instrument.

As I have illustrated elsewhere (Morra, 2020), the North African ʻūds are an “African phenomenon” with respect to the "internal"- inward tuning. By this term, I mean that it points towards a sub-Saharan origin or relationship through its morphological features. Over the centuries, the instrument would have been played and adapted to other local African morphologies of instruments by the different ethnic groups using it. However, the instrument has gained a central place in mālūf music and has helped to define this Andalusian - North African musical genre, although it presents varying degrees of direct and indirect engagements with other cultures surrounding it, including Black African cultures that were disparaged by Rouanet (see Turner this volume). This African phenomenon brings together elements of geographically close instrument families, namely West African lutes (Farmer, 1928; Charry, 1996; Gouja, 2014) grounded in a wide range of musical practices in black communities known as the Dīwān in Algeria, the gnāwa of Morocco, and Tunisian sṭambēlī (see Turner). Both the length of the neck and tuning system are commonplace elements in the plucked lutes (with fingers or plectrum) of West Africa. As such, it is important to gain a sense of the ʻūd ʻarbī as an African instrument whose tunings (Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian) and associated playing techniques are the product of its appropriation and use of a specifically African musical context.

Conclusion

This chapter has ended with identifying how local ethnic factors are ordered, given meaning and ascribed function in the instruments themselves. In line with Rouanet’s instrument classification, the North African lutes (ʻūd and kwītra) are situated in numerous dimensions that intersect at different levels among each other. Variants of ʻūd (length of the neck and tuning patterns, number of strings, nomenclature), and types (African and Maghrebian) are the results of transformation and adaptation. These factors are by no means static; indeed, they often overlap, so that the instrument is classified for some aspects as Algerian, Tunisian, Maghrebian, and for others African and Eastern.

I have concentrated on analysing an historical instrument, a kwītra, in the MIM museum in Brussels, whose aspects, shapes and measurements appear to be similar to the kwītra described in Rouanet’s text. I have argued that the way the instruments were described is intricately related to questions about heritage construction and lineage of culture transmission for North African lutes passage from the 19^th to the 20^th century. I have demonstrated that the kwītra can be evaluated according to its designs, which are based on symbolic analogies, for example the rosette and the bridge shapes. These markers are the key to defining the instrument through intimate expressions held today by makers and players. Concerning exchanges between different communities in North Africa,
I suggest that practices of certain tuning patterns evoke an encounter between Maghribis and sub-Saharan people and their fusion into a unique African version of the lute. I have also suggested that the tuning pattern shifts the kwītra's context to a "non-Arab"/"non-Algerian" one which links it to sub-Saharan Africa. Equally important in accounting for the cultural significance of the North African ʻūds has been an understanding of the interchange of Arab Andalusian - African cultures in which the instrument itself participates.

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Salvatore MORRA[1]

Notes

[1] Università degli Studi della Tuscia

[2] Salīm Fergani, personal communication, 2 March 2017. Badreddine, Guettaf, personal communication, 18 June 2017.180 Salīm Dada, personal communication, 23 November 2015.

[3] Kāmil al-Khula‘ī (1870-1931) was a distinguished Egyptian musician, singer (with the theatrical ensemble of sheikh Salāmah Ḥijāzi), writer and composer (muwashahat and operettas).