VIHUELA

in full Vihuela De Mano, stringed musical instrument that in Spanish Renaissance art music held the popularity accorded the lute elsewhere in Europe. Built like a large guitar, it had six, sometimes seven, double courses of strings tuned like the lute: Gcfadg. (The guitar then had four double courses.) The vihuela was played by the aristocracy, the guitar by commoners. By the 18th century both instruments had given rise to the six-stringed guitar. The vihuela de arco was a viola da gamba, or viol.