![]() Their pegboxes were bent backward and many were played with a plectrum and these instruments called barbat (an old Persian instrument) are said to be an ancestor of the four-stringed type of biwa, oud, or lute. Instruments similar to biwa are often found in relief carving decorations of artifacts excavated from remains of Sessanian Persia, though the actual ones do not exist any more. ![]() ![]() The only existing actual biwa, 'Raden shitan Gogen no Biwa' has been preserved in the Shoso-in Treasure Repository (see figure). The five-stringed type of biwa with a straight neck (Chokukei) is said to have its origin in India and its pegbox is not bent but straight. It has a sound box shaped like an egg cut in half lengthwise and a neck with a pegbox (the part which the tuning pegs are inserted into) bent roughly 90 degrees backwards. The four-stringed type of biwa (Kyokukei) has a common origin with the oud (lute-like instrument of Arabic Origin) in West Asia and the lute in Europe and a similar shape to those. In a broad sense, stringed instruments of the lute family such as genkan (ruanxian) (four or five-stringed Chinese lute) and gekkin (moon harp) are sometimes included in the biwa group. (It was played in the 1930s, too.) The four-stringed biwa with more than a dozen frets that was introduced to the Ming Dynasty had been handed down in Vietnam and it is written biwa but pronounced as 'tipa.' It was introduced to the Korean Peninsula and divided into the Kyo biwa (five-stringed biwa) and the To biwa (four-stringed biwa) and became basic instruments of court musicians and had been used until the end of the Joseon Dynasty. The latter is not used any more because its tradition has not been carried on, but the former developed later and had increased the number of its variety in China and Japan and many are still played even today. In ancient times, there were two types of biwa: the four-stringed type with a neck bent backward (Kyokukei Biwa) and the five-stringed type with a straight neck (Chokukei Biwa). ![]() It is a plucked string instrument that produces sounds by flicking strings with fingers without using a bow. Biwa (biwa, biba, pipa) is one of the stringed instruments of the lute family in East Asia. ![]()
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