rebec

American  

[ree-bek] / ˈri bɛk /

Or rebeck

noun

1. a Renaissance fiddle with a pear-shaped body tapering into a neck that ends in a sickle-shaped or scroll-shaped pegbox.

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rebec British  

/ ˈriːbɛk /

noun

1. a medieval stringed instrument resembling the violin but having a lute-shaped body

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Etymology

Origin of rebec

1745–55; < Middle French; replacing Middle English ribibe < Old French rebebe ≪ Arabic rabāb rebab

Example Sentences

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

The vocal parts suggest everything from Gregorian chant to folk song, the orchestra includes such authentic curiosities as a rebec, a vielle and a minstrel's harp.

From Time Magazine Archive

The Empire of Galilee was not much more advanced; among its music one could hardly distinguish some miserable rebec, from the infancy of the art, still imprisoned in the re-la-mi.

From Notre-Dame De Paris by Hapgood, Isabel Florence

And on that day, to the rebec gay   They frolicked with lovesome swains; They are gone, they are dead, in the churchyard laid,   But the tree—it still remains.

From McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader by McGuffey, William Holmes

One of them is a rebec with three strings; the other is a small violin.

From A Popular History of the Art of Music From the Earliest Times Until the Present by Mathews, W. S. B. (William Smythe Babcock)