One Hundred Years Plus

Pardon the out-of-tune strings but this Harp Zither or Guitar Zither, as it was coined in Germany, is well over one hundred years old and I was very careful not to push tuning since these are original strings you are hearing me play. 

Sears began making this instrument in 1902, calling it a Zither #2.  My great-grandmother Nora Thayer Duncan ordered one from the Sears catalogue and played it for her family as an accompaniment for hymn singing, usually on Sunday evenings. 

​My Grandma Char, her youngest daughter, granted my wish to inherit this treasure, recalling her mother playing it.

On her hundredth birthday ....... I surprised her by playing several of those old hymns on the Zither.  There weren't too many dry eyes after that special music.

 

Do you see the shape of another more common instrument in the Zither?  Ideas?