If you're reading this, maybe you're considering taking up the lyre! In this post we'll answer a few basic questions about this beautiful and ancient instrument.

What is a lyre?

Without getting into a huge organological debate, at its simplest and in layperson's terms, a "zither" is a box with strings running across it, a "harp" is a box with an arm from which strings enter directly into the box at an angle, a "lyre" is like between a harp and a zither, where the "head" that holds the strings is stretched out by (generally) two arms, and the strings run across the gap between arms and the body.

What musical traditions use the lyre?

With modern hindsight, the lyre is heavily associated with the Ancient civilizations of the Middle East (including the Israelites), Ancient Greece, and the Middle Ages of Europe. Lyres died out in many places, but survived to relatively recent time in Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of the Middle East, Scandinavia (the bowed lyres), and in other small niches.

How many strings does a lyre have?

Arguably 1 to infinity strings, but the vast majority of lyres will have 5-16 strings, above 20 generally being considered large lyres, in some cases held and played much like a small harp, but considered lyres for technical reasons.

Is the lyre easy to learn?

It's all relative, but broadly I would say yes. A lyre (bowed lyres being the exception) basically has only as many notes as it has strings, so it's pretty easy to keep track of your notes and hard to hit a wrong one. We can debate this in individual threads, but as a broad generalization I'd say they're relatively easy to learn, but with plenty of potential for challenge, so I'd happily recommend the lyre to people with zero musical background, as well as to experienced musicians wanting a new challenge.

Buying Guide

Money doesn't grow on trees, so "how much do lyres cost?" is an issue I expect readers want to raise. The good news is they're easy to build, so run really quite affordable compared to other string instruments. Speaking broadly, for $30-$99 you can buy some lyres which are are of basic but playable quality, $100-400 gets you a really solid basic lyre depending on size and design, budgets of $600-999 can get you a really good model of just about anything short of amazing large and/or custom stuff.

For details on recommended models at different tiers, see our Lyre Buying Guide. If you want to browse more widely, or already kind of know what you want and need to find who makes such, check out our Directory of lyre makers/sellers

Lyre Books

• Lyre Wiki: Directory of lyre books

Materials for other instruments that can apply to some lyres

• Lyre Wiki: directory of books for other instruments, that can be applied to the lyre

Other discussion forums

• r/BowedLyres (for lyre-type instruments played with a bow, largely Welsh or Scandinavian)

• r/KoraHarp (for African harps and lyres)

• Facebook Group: The Lyre

• Facebook Group: Bowed Lyre

• Facebook Community: Anglo-Saxon Lyre

I'm just putting down the results of my last research frenzy. I've been trying to find the exact instrument that Lyra's cutie-mark represents, partly because people often mistake it for other barely related instruments and partly because I'm a massive nerd.

Though, it's mostly the former.

Well first of all, it's not a harp, it's a lyre! No, they're not synonymous, they're entirely different instruments.

The harp has its strings attached directly into its hollow body, while the lyre has more in common with lutes, as its strings are attached to a bridge which transmits the vibrations.

Got it?! Good! Let's not harp on that any longer.

But of course, lyre is a very diverse family of instruments. Would you believe that this is also a lyre? Would Lyra be able to play that? Probably. But we're not here to talk about all the instruments that she could play (though you're free to discuss that), but to talk about what kind of lyre does her cutie-mark specifically represent.

Because it's one of those horseshoe shaped lyres (how fitting). The last time I made the same research, when I was writing my song Jammin' with Lyra (man that song was a pain in the ass), I somehow came to the conclusion, that Lyra's horseshoe shaped lyre has only seven strings.

But this time, I've found that such lyres don't actually exist. Well, not ones that are so streamlined looking. There are lyres that are horseshoe shaped, but not this simple. The iconic horseshoe shaped instrument, is just a simplified stereotypical representation.

So let's talk about the possible candidates.

First, you have the chelys lyre, said to have been invented by Hermes, using the shell of a tortoise for the hollow body.

Sample

Another lyre of ancient greek origin is the cithara, which does have that horseshoe shape, and is said to have seven strings. Though a more skillful citharode could use strings more than that. The cithara however is also said to be a virtuoso's instrument, because it requires a great deal of skill to play, what with all that extra stuff added onto the top. Which I don't doubt Lyra could deal with.

Sample

But lyres weren't exclusive to ancient greece. Many other cultures had their own lyres as well. Which leads us to the jewish lyre, or kinnor. It does have that horseshoe shape and it is played with a pick. And apparently the minimum number of kinnors to be played in the temple is nine, with no upper limit... Interesting.

Sample

It's also a jewish national symbol, which is interesting. I have seen greek Lyra and Irish Lyra, but I don't think I have seen a jewish Lyra before.

Now that I brought up the Irish, there's also a gallic lyre. It also has a horseshoe shape and it does commonly have only seven strings. It also lead me to the lyrist Atelier Skald, go check him out. In fact, the gallic and jewish lyres are the ones that resemble that simplified U shape the closest.

Sample

So those are the instruments I found, that are the closest to Lyra's cutie-mark. The chelys tortoise shell lyre, the more advanced cithara, the jewish lyre also known as kinnor and the gallic lyre. Which do you think it is? Do you perhaps have a better proposition? I probably overlooked a lot of things, so if something I said doesn't match up, then you should know that I'm just simply wrong and not a liar.

Perhaps Lyra herself could say a lot on the subject.

Big shoutout to Michael Levy, who's got an extensive work on many different types of lyres and a youtube channel where you can listen to his work.

I'll also be posting a song I wrote myself, for a seven string lyre.

Here's a download link to it until then.