The jadagan (, , or Siberian harp) is a wooden board

zither Zither (; , from the Greek ''cithara'') is a class of stringed instruments. The modern instrument has many strings stretched across a thin, flat body. Zithers are typically played by strumming or plucking the strings with the fingers or a ...

of the

Khakas The Khakas are a Turkic indigenous people of Siberia, who live in the republic of Khakassia, Russia. They speak the Khakas language. The Khakhassian people are direct descendants of various ancient cultures that have inhabited southern Siberia ...

people in

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

. The jadagan usually has 6 or 7 strings stretched across movable bridges and tuned a fourth or fifth apart. The body is hollowed out from underneath like an upturned trough. It has a convex surface and an end bent towards the ground. The strings are plucked and the sound is very smooth. The length of the instrument is around . The instrument was considered to be sacrosanct and playing it was a rite bound to taboos. It was mainly used at court and in monasteries, since strings symbolised the twelve levels of the palace hierarchy.

In the West

Folklorist Nancy Thym-Hochrein has researched the instrument, and musician Raphael De Cock is a contemporary player.

Related instruments

Yatga The yatga (, Khalkha dialect: ; ; is a traditional plucked zither of Mongolia. Yatga may vary widely in size, tuning, and number of bridges and strings; The body is a long wooden box, one end of which is angled downward. The performer plucks ...

: Mongolia * Koto: Japan *

Guzheng The zheng (), or guzheng (), is a Chinese List of Chinese musical instruments#Plucked, plucked zither. The modern guzheng commonly has 21, 25, or 26 strings, is long, and is tuned in a Major scale, major pentatonic scale. It has a large, reson ...

: China *

Zither Zither (; , from the Greek ''cithara'') is a class of stringed instruments. The modern instrument has many strings stretched across a thin, flat body. Zithers are typically played by strumming or plucking the strings with the fingers or a ...

* Se: China *

Gayageum The ''gayageum'' or ''kayagum'' () is a traditional Korean musical instrument. It is a plucked zither with 12 strings, though some more recent variants have 18, 21 or 25 strings. It is probably the best known traditional Korean musical instr ...

: Korea *

Đàn tranh The ''đàn tranh'' (, ) or ''đàn thập lục''Le, Tuan Hung. Dan Tranh Music of Vietnam : Traditions and Innovations. Melbourne, Tokyo : Australia Asia Foundation, 1998. (hard back); (paperback), page 1 is a Plucked string instrument, pluc ...

: Vietnam *

Kanun (instrument) The qanun, kanun, ganoun or kanoon (; ; ; , ''qanun''; , ''qānūn''; ; ; ) is a Middle Eastern string instrument played either solo, or more often as part of an ensemble, in much of Iran, Arab East, and Arab Maghreb region of North Africa, ...

Kanklės The ''kanklės'' () is a Lithuanian plucked string instrument (chordophone) belonging to the Baltic box zither family known as the Baltic psaltery, along with the Latvian '' kokles'', Estonian '' kannel'', Finnish '' kantele'', and Russian '' ...

: Lithuania *

Jetigen The jetigen (, , or dzhetigan or zhetygen) is a Kazakh plucked zither. Similar to Chinese guzheng, yazheng and se, Japanese koto, Korean gayageum and ajaeng, Mongolian yatga, Vietnamese đàn tranh, and Sundanese kacapi. The strings ...

: Kazakhstan *

Ajaeng The ''ajaeng'' () is a Korean string instrument. It is a wide zither with strings of twisted silk. It is played with a slender stick of forsythia wood that is drawn across the strings in the manner of a bow (or it can be played w/ a Horsehair ...

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Yazheng The yazheng (; also spelled ''zha zheng'' or ''zha cheng'') is a Chinese string instrument. It is a traditional zither similar to the guzheng but bowed by scraping with a rosined stick or a horsehair bow, (or plucked sometimes). The musical instr ...

: China

Notes

Box zithers Khakas Tuvan musical instruments {{zither-instrument-stub