Meaning

A small, quill-plucked, gut-strung musical instrument, most commonly with three to four strings in doubles courses; it is a flat-backed predecessor of the guitar, and it originated around the 13th century, coming to Europe via Moorish Spain..

Definitions by Sense

1. A small, quill-plucked, gut-strung musical instrument, most commonly with three to four strings in doubles courses; it is a flat-backed predecessor of the guitar, and it originated around the 13th century, coming to Europe via Moorish Spain.
2. To play on the gittern.

Example Sentences

Now they can no more hear thy ghittern’s tune, / For venturing syllables that ill beseem / The quiet glooms of such a piteous theme.

c. 1639-1640. John Milton, The Cambridge Manuscript; Excerpts from pages 35-41, as Reprinted in David Masson, editor & author, The Life of John Milton: Narrated in Connection with the Political, Ecclesiastical, and Literary History of his Time; Volume II, London and New York.: MacMillan and Co, 1871, page 109. … [E]ach evening every one with mistress, or Ganymede, glitterning along the streets, or solacing on the banks of Jordan, or down the stream.

Word Forms

• gitterns
• ghittern
• gitterning
• gitterned

Synonyms for gittern

Related Words

When Should You Use Gittern?

Use gittern when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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