Frame zither

{{Infobox instrument

| name = Jacqke/Frame zither

| image = COLLECTIE TROPENMUSEUM Harp van kalebas TMnr 2436-5.jpg

| image_size = 200px

| alt = Liberian frame zither with calabash resonator

| caption = Liberian zither with calabash resonator. Called a "harp" by its collector; however, on a harp the "plane of the strings lies perpendicular to the resonator's surface." The strings running parallel to the gourd resonator make this a frame zither under Hornbostel-Sachs.

| background = string

| names = belly harp

| classification = String instrument

Chordophone

Plucked string instrument

| hornbostel_sachs = 316

• 316.1 Without resonator.
• 316.2 With resonator.

| hornbostel_sachs_desc = Instruments which are in essence simply a string or strings and a string bearer. The strings are stretched across an open frame

| inventors = folk instrument

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{{multiple image

| caption_align = center

| header_align = center

| align = left

| image1 = Benedictine Psalter, Psalterium.jpg

| width1 = 250px

| alt1 = Benedictine psalter

| caption1 = Stylized drawing in a medieval manuscript shows a man playing an instrument with strings stretched across a frame. Text reveals it is a psaltery, which means it would have a board behind the strings and not be a frame zither.

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Frame zither is a class of musical instrument (subset of zither) within the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system for a type of simple chordophone (stringed instrument), in which the body of the instrument is made from a frame.{{cite journal |title= Classification of Musical Instruments: Translated from the Original German by Anthony Baines and Klaus P. Wachsmann |author1-first= Erich M. |author1-last= von Hornbostel |author2-first=Curt |author2-last= Sachs |journal= The Galpin Society Journal |volume= 14 |date= March 1961| pages= 20–21 |doi= 10.2307/842168 |jstor= 842168 |url= https://www.jstor.org/stable/842168 |quote= [Example:] Perhaps in medieval psalteries.|url-access= subscription }}

Frame zithers are musical instruments in which strings are strung across an open frame.{{cite encyclopedia |editor-last= Sadie |editor-first=Stanley |title= Frame zither|encyclopedia= The New Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments |year=1984 |id= Volume 1 |page= 794}} They could be similar to harps and psalteries which can also have strings stretched across frames. However, in harps the strings run from the frame to a resonating table embedded into the frame on the frame's other end. Psalteries may also have a frame, but behind the strings (parallel to them) is a board, the top of a box which acts as a resonator.

Musicians may add a resonator as is done with a bow harp; they can attach or put the instrument into a calabash gourd or a ceramic pot.{{cite book |author= Ulrich Wegner |title=Afrikanische Saiteninstrumente. Veröffentlichungen des Museums für Völkerkunde Berlin. Neue Folge 41. Abteilung Musikethnologie V (translation: African string instruments. Publications of the Museum for Ethnology, Berlin. New series 41, Department of Ethnic Music V |publisher= Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz |place= Berlin |date=1984|pages=76–81}}

Under the Hornbostel-Sachs system of musical instrument classification, any frame with strings stretched across, and without a built in resonator, would count as a frame zither. In musical instrument encyclopedias, however, there are few or no examples of frame zithers except those found in Africa. Potential examples include medieval European illustrations; these however are not clear and could equally illustrate forms of harps or psalteries.