trough zither

The tradition & historical record

Trough zithers are a group of African stringed instruments or chordophones whose members resemble wooden bowls, pans, platters, or shallow gutters with strings stretched across the opening. A type of zither, the instruments may be quiet, depending upon the shape of the bowl or string-holder. Sound is often amplified with the addition of a gourd resonator. Instruments have been classed into five different types, based on shape. The resonator is most commonly a gourd, but tin cans have also been used. An instrument of East and Central Africa, mainly Rwanda and Burundi. Parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania as well, near the borders with Rwanda and Burundi. ¹

Ulrich Wegner (1984) divides the East African shell zithers into five groups according to their shape. ¹

The inanga of the intermediate lake area with a wide, flat bowl shape and low edges belongs to type A. In this case, a single string of strings is run continuously around notches on the rounded narrow sides. ¹

The ligombo of type B is characterized by a very narrow, flat shape that tapers towards the middle of the sides. The string is fed through holes on the narrow sides. Apart from the Hehe, this type comes from the Wakinga in the Njombe Region in southern Tanzania, the Sangu in the Mbeya Region in the southwest, the Bena in the Iringa Region and among the Kaguru in the eastern center of the country. A shorter version of the ligombo with seven strings among the Safwa who live in the territory of the Sangu in the Mbeya Region is called sumbi. ¹

Type C differs from the otherwise similar type B in that it has a deeper semi-tubular shape and straight longitudinal walls. It occurs north of the distribution area of type B especially among the Gogo in the central Tanzanian region of Dodoma, among the Turu in the Singida Region, with the Sandawe in the Kondoa District and the Isanzu in Iramba district (Singida Region). ¹

Type D is again long and narrow, but has a flat bottom and straight side walls at right angles to it. Its distribution area is along the east coast with the Zaramo and Kwere in the Pwani Region and further south with the Makonde. ¹

The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Trough zither”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. ¹

trough zither is class of musical instruments, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. ²