mandolin
Americannoun
noun
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a plucked stringed instrument related to the lute, having four pairs of strings tuned in ascending fifths stretched over a small light body with a fretted fingerboard. It is usually played with a plectrum, long notes being sustained by the tremolo
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a vegetable slicer consisting of a flat stainless-steel frame with adjustable cutting blades
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of mandolin
1700–10; < Italian mandolino, diminutive of mandola, variant of mandora, alteration of pandora bandore
Explanation
A mandolin is a bit like a small guitar — it's a musical instrument with a wooden body, strings, and a long neck. A musician plays a mandolin by plucking or strumming the strings. Its sound is higher than a guitar, and it's often played alongside lower-pitched instruments, such as banjos and guitars. The mandolin is popular around the world and in many different kinds of music; in the United States, it's played most often in country music. The word itself comes from the Italian mandolino, which is an altered form of the Latin pandura, or "three-stringed lute."
Vocabulary lists containing mandolin
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Rima Fand’s pleasant, folk-tinged score is illustrative rather than striking; the accompanying ensemble of mandolin, string quartet and bass, led from the piano by Mila Henry, plays a lot of ostinatos.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 12, 2026
A former child prodigy on the mandolin, Hull opened the evening flexing her Berklee-trained chops in a series of lickety-split bluegrass numbers that got early arrivers whistling with approval.
From Los Angeles Times • May 17, 2025
He played the guitar and mandolin, and she played the violin.
From Slate • Jan. 26, 2025
He started off on the guitar, then moved onto the mandolin, and is now trying to learn the fiddle, all "just for enjoyment".
From BBC • Jan. 12, 2025
He jerked his hands from the strings of the mandolin so that a phrase of music was chopped off.
From "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
