chiwang

{{Short description|Type of fiddle played in Bhutan}}

File:Blind musician in Lhasa Band.jpg playing piwang in 1937]]

The chiwang (Dzongkha: སྤྱི་དབང་; Wylie: spyi-dbang){{cite journal|title=The Attributes and Values of Folk and Popular Songs |journal=Journal of Bhutan Studies |volume=3 |issue=1 |first=Sonam |last=Kinga |accessdate=2011-10-30 |url=http://www.thlib.org/static/reprints/jbs/JBS_03_01_05.pdf |format=PDF |year=2003 |pages=132–170}} is a type of fiddle played in Bhutan.{{cite book|title=History of Bhutan Based on Buddhism |first=C. T |last=Dorji |publisher=Sangay Xam; Prominent Publishers |year=1994 |isbn=81-86239-01-4 |page=15 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yA9uAAAAMAAJ |accessdate=2011-10-30}} The chiwang, the lingm (flute), and the dramyen (lute) comprise the basic instrumental inventory for traditional Bhutanese folk music.

Although the chiwang is considered typically Bhutanese, it is a variety of the piwang, a Tibetan two-stringed fiddle. It is heavily associated with boedra, one of two dominant genres of Bhutanese folk music, in which it symbolizes a horse.{{cite book|title=The Greenwood Encyclopedia of World Folklore and Folklife: Southeast Asia and India, Central and East Asia, Middle East |volume=2 |first=William M. |last=Clements |publisher=Greenwood Press |year=2006 |isbn=0-313-32849-8 |pages=106–110 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZvrWAAAAMAAJ |accessdate=2011-10-16}}