Editing Oud (section)

===Musical instruments from pre-history===
{{See also|Lute#History and evolution of the lute}}

{{multiple image
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| image1            = Egyptian lute players 001.jpg
| alt1              = Egyptian long lutes, {{circa|1350 BC}}
| caption1          = Egyptian lute players with long-necked lutes. Fresco from the tomb of Nebamun, a nobleman in the 18th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, {{circa|1350 BC}}
| image2            = Indo-GreekBanquet.JPG
| alt2              = Gandhara banquet with lute player
| caption2          = Hellenistic banquet scene from the 1st century AD, [[Hadda, Afghanistan|Hadda]], [[Gandhara]]. Short-necked, 2-string lute held by player, far right
}}
[[File:Relief or architectural ornament with an oudh player, Iran, 11th-12th century, slip-painted earthenware - Royal Ontario Museum - DSC04641.JPG|thumb|upright|left|alt=Oud type instrument iran 11th-12th centuries ad|Iran, 11th or 12th century A.D. Earthenware statue of a musician playing a short-necked, lute-style instrument]]

The complete history of the development of the lute family is not fully compiled at this date, only some of it. The highly influential organologist Curt Sachs distinguished between the "long-necked lute" and the short-necked variety.<ref name=sachsshortlong>{{cite book |last=Sachs |first=Curt |date=1940 |title=The History of Musical Instruments |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofmusical00sach|url-access=registration |location=New York |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |pages=[https://archive.org/details/historyofmusical00sach/page/251 251], 253 |isbn=9780393020687 }}</ref> Douglas Alton Smith argues the long-necked variety should not be called lute at all because it existed for at least a millennium before the appearance of the short-necked instrument that eventually evolved into what is now known as the lute.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Douglas Alton|title=A History of the Lute from Antiquity to the Renaissance|date=2002|publisher=Lute Society of America (LSA)|isbn=978-0-9714071-0-7}}</ref>

Musicologist [[Richard Dumbrill (musicologist)|Richard Dumbrill]] today uses the word more categorically to discuss instruments that existed millennia before the term "lute" was coined.<ref name=dumbrill1>{{Cite book |title=The archaeomusicology of the Ancient Near East |author=Dumbrill, Richard J. |date=2005 |publisher=Trafford |pages=305–310 |isbn=9781412055383 |location=Victoria, B.C. |oclc=62430171 |quote=The long-necked lute would have stemmed from the bow-harp and eventually became the tunbur; and the fat-bodied smaller lute would have evolved into the modern Oud. ... the lute pre-dated the lyre which can therefore be considered as a development of the lute, rather than the contrary, as had been thought until quite recently ... Thus the lute not only dates but also locates the transition from musical protoliteracy to musical literacy ...}}</ref> Dumbrill documented more than 3000 years of iconographic evidence for the lutes in Mesopotamia, in his book ''The Archaeomusicology of the Ancient Near East''. According to Dumbrill, the lute family included instruments in [[Mesopotamia]] prior to 3000&nbsp;BC.<ref name=Dumbrillp321>{{harvnb|Dumbrill|1998|p=321}}</ref> He points to a [[cylinder seal]] as evidence; dating from {{circa}} 3100&nbsp;BC or earlier (now in the possession of the British Museum); the seal depicts on one side what is thought to be a woman playing a stick "lute".<ref name="Dumbrillp321"/><ref name=Britishmuseum>{{cite web |url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1447477&partId=1&people=24615&peoA=24615-3-17&page=1 |publisher=British Museum |title=Cylinder Seal, Culture/period Uruk, Date (circa) 3100BC, Museum number 41632}}</ref> Like Sachs, Dumbrill saw length as distinguishing lutes, dividing the Mesopotamian lutes into a long-necked variety and a short.<ref name=Dumbrillp310>{{harvnb|Dumbrill|1998|p=310}}</ref> He focuses on the longer lutes of Mesopotamia, and similar types of related necked chordophones that developed throughout the ancient world: [[ancient Greece|Greek]], [[Ancient Egypt|Egyptian]] (in the [[Middle Kingdom of Egypt|Middle Kingdom]]), Elamites, [[Hittites|Hittite]], [[Ancient Rome|Roman]], [[Bulgars|Bulgar]], [[Turkic peoples|Turkic]], [[India]]n, [[China|Chinese]], [[Armenian people|Armenian]]/[[Cilician]], [[Phoenicia|Canaanite/Phoenician]], [[History of ancient Israel and Judah|Israelite/Judean]], and various other cultures. He names among the long lutes, the [[pandura]], the [[panduri]], [[tambur]] and [[tanbur]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Dumbrill |first=Richard J. |date=2005 |title=The Archaeomusicology of the Ancient Near East |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nlm1Kbc7P5UC&q=dumbrill%2C+long+lutes&pg=PA320 |location=Victoria, British Columbia |publisher=Trafford Publishing |pages=319–320 |isbn=978-1-4120-5538-3|quote=The long-necked lute in the OED is orthographed as tambura; tambora, tamera, tumboora; tambur(a) and tanpoora. We have an Arabic Õunbur; Persian tanbur; Armenian pandir; Georgian panturi. and a Serbo-Croat tamburitza. The Greeks called it pandura; panduros; phanduros; panduris or pandurion. The Latin is pandura. It is attested as a Nubian instrument in the third century BC. The earliest literary allusion to lutes in Greece comes from Anaxilas in his play The Lyre-maker as 'trichordos' ... According to Pollux, the trichordon [''sic''] was Assyrian and they gave it the name pandoura ... These instruments survive today in the form of the various Arabian ''tunbar'' ...}}</ref>

The line of short-necked lutes was further developed to the east of Mesopotamia, in [[Bactria]] and [[Gandhara]], into a short, almond-shaped lute.<ref name=Iranica/><ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.clevelandart.org/art/1980.15|title= Bracket with two musicians 100s, Pakistan, Gandhara, probably Butkara in Swat, Kushan Period (1st century-320)|publisher= The Cleveland Museum of Art|access-date=March 25, 2015}}</ref> Curt Sachs talked about the depictions of Gandharan lutes in art, where they are presented in a mix of "Northwest Indian art" under "strong Greek influences".<ref name=sachs2>{{cite book |last=Sachs |first=Curt |date=1940 |title= The History of Musical Instruments |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofmusical00sach|url-access=registration |location= New York |publisher= W. W. Norton & Company |pages= [https://archive.org/details/historyofmusical00sach/page/159 159–161]|isbn=9780393020687 }}</ref> The short-necked lutes in these Gandhara artworks were "the venerable ancestor of the Islamic, the Sino-Japanese and the European lute families."<ref name=sachs2/> He described the Gandhara lutes as having a "pear-shaped body tapering towards the short neck, a frontal stringholder, lateral pegs, and either four or five strings."<ref name=sachs2/> The oldest images of short-necked lutes from the area that Sachs knew of were "Persian figurines of the 8th century B.C.," found in excavations at Suza, but he knew of nothing connecting these to the Oud-related Gandharan art 8 centuries later.<ref name=sachs2/>