Viol family instruments

The viola da gamba (), or viol, or informally gamba, is a bowed and fretted string instrument that is played (i.e. "on the leg"). It is distinct from the later violin, or ; and it is any one of the earlier viol family of bowed, fretted, and stringed instruments with hollow wooden bodies and pegboxes where the tension on the strings can be increased or decreased to adjust the pitch of each of the strings. Although treble, tenor and bass were most commonly used, viols came in different sizes, including (high treble, developed in 18th century), treble, alto, small tenor, tenor, bass and contrabas

musical instrument

thumb|A copy of Prince Esterhazy's baryton, on display at his palace in Eisenstadt. The baryton is a bowed string instrument similar to the viol, but distinguished by an extra set of sympathetic but also pluckable strings. It was in regular use in Europe until the end of the 18th century.

thumb|right|240px|Some early double basses were conversions of existing violones. This 1640 painting shows a bass violone being played.

Viol performance style

bowed string instrument of the violin family