Gudok is an ancient
Russian string musical instrument, which was played with a
bow.
Gudok usually has 3 strings: 2 of them were tuned in
unison and the 3rd one
fifth higher. All 3 strings were placed in the same plane, so a bow could make them all sound simultaneously (not like in
violin, where only 2 strings can be reached at any momement). Sometimes it has also several several (up to 8)
sympathetic strings under the upper
sounding board. These made
gudok's sound warm and rich. When playing
gudok an artist held it on its lap like a
cello or
viola da gamba. Initially (in
12th century and probably before)
gudok was played using
harmonics only, without pressing strings to instrument's neck. Later (in
14th century and after) some modifications of
gudok had a real
neck for pressing strings, but this wasn't very useful because of specific instrument's shape and was an obvious borrowing from
fiddles.
Now gudoks are entirely ceased away for several centures already. Nobody really plays them and only in museums you can see some reconstructions. Gudok always have been a folk, skomorokh instrument, so very few of them remains to our time.
There were several attempts to revive gudoks in music. In Borodin's opera Prince Igor there's a 'Gudok Players Song', which is an authour's reconstruction of how gudok may have sounded. But in practice it's performed with modern violins and altos of course.
Nowadays some folk Russian groups try to make their playalble gudok reconstructions and to use them on their performances.
The nearest relative of gudok is Bulgarian gadulka.hu:gudok
