Description
The Pipa is a four-stringed Chinese musical instrument, belonging to the plucked category of instruments. Sometimes called the Chinese lute, the instrument has a pear-shaped wooden body with a varying number of frets ranging from 12 to 26. According to Han dynasty sources, the origins of the name “pipa” refer to how the instrument is played. “Pi” meant “to play forward” and “pa” means “to play backward”. However, as no other types of sources reference this etymology; scholars suspect that the instrument more likely originated outside China, and that its name references a foreign language term.
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