Editing Lyre (section)

=== Number of strings ===
Before Greek civilization had assumed its historic form (c. 1200 BCE), there was likely to have been great freedom and independence of different localities in the matter of lyre stringing, which is corroborated by the antique use of the chromatic (half-tone) and enharmonic ([[quarter-tone]]) tunings - pointing to an early exuberance, and perhaps also to a bias towards refinements of intonation.{{original research inline|date=October 2019}} The number of strings on the classical lyre therefore varied, with three, four, six, seven, eight and ten having been popular at various times.

The priest and biographer [[Plutarch]] (c. 100 CE) wrote of the musicians of the [[Greek Heroic Age|archaic period]] [[Olympus (musician)|Olympus]] and [[Terpander]], that they used only three strings to accompany their recitation; but there is no evidence for or against this dating from that period. The earliest known lyre had four strings, tuned to create a [[tetrachord]] or series of four tones filling in the interval of a perfect fourth. By doubling the tetrachord a lyre with seven or eight strings was obtained. Likewise the three-stringed lyre may have given rise to the six-stringed lyre depicted on many archaic Greek vases. The accuracy of this representation cannot be insisted upon, the vase painters being little mindful of the complete expression of details; yet one may suppose their tendency would be rather to imitate than to invent a number. It was their constant practice to represent the strings as being damped by the fingers of the left hand of the player, after having been struck by the plectrum held in the right hand.<ref name=West1992/>