psaltery
Americannoun
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an ancient musical instrument consisting of a flat sounding box with numerous strings which are plucked with the fingers or with a plectrum.
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(initial capital letter) the Psalter.
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of psaltery
1300–50; Middle English sautrie < Middle French sauter(i)e < Late Latin psaltērium; see Psalter
Vocabulary lists containing psaltery
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.
See Examples For:
The action is accompanied by music suggestive of everything from Gregorian chant to folk song, played on reproductions of such authentic medieval instruments as a psaltery, a rebec, a minstrel's harp.
From Time Magazine Archive
Along with lonely exponents of the virginal, the psaltery and the oboe d'amore, there are 166 violinists, 88 organists, 73 harpsichordists, 64 flautists and 56 cellists listed, each count a statistical gain over 1960.
From Time Magazine Archive
She strummed on a psaltery which looks like a large, shallow cigar-box with strings.
From Time Magazine Archive
When possible, they stuffed their 150-lb. psaltery, dulcimer, fiddles, banjos, guitars, buckskin drums and camping equipment into and on top of their Volkswagen and toured the mountain towns and country fairs.
From Time Magazine Archive
They no longer care to listen to our songs, or when we play upon the harp or psaltery.
From The Girls of Hillcrest Farm The Secret of the Rocks by Marlowe, Amy Bell
He brought a bit of everything with him: lutes, gambas, hurdy-gurdies, psalteries, fancy carved music stands and even a serpent, an old wind instrument that looks like its namesake.
From New York Times ● Jun. 15, 2011
Once, he had carried Robin to another part of the monastery, and showed him where records of everyday living were written and poems and psalteries copied.
From "The Door in the Wall" by Marguerite de Angeli
And they came to Jerusalem with psalteries and harps and trumpets unto the house of the Lord.
From The Bible Story by Hall, Newton Marshall
The noise of drums, fifes, psalteries, harps, and sackbuts was heard.
From Voltaire's Romances, Complete in One Volume by
The vibrating strings of the clavicytherium in the Kraus Museum are stretched horizontally over two kinds of psalteries fixed one over the other.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 4 "Cincinnatus" to "Cleruchy" by Various
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.
