The 6-string guitar is the modern descendant of a sub-family of the "chordophone" class of vibrating string instruments, from which the bowed string family such as violins, and fixed-length plucked string instruments such as the harp and lyre, are also derived. The name comes from the Latin "cithara" and related Greek "kithara", which themselves are the name of an ancient instrument more like a lyre or harp. The first examples of instruments resembling the modern guitar are from the Andalusian region, about the 12th century, believed to be derived from the European lute and related Moorish oud. These evolved into the Spanish "vihuela""vihuela" or "viola de mano""viola de mano", a fretted instrument with a narrow, "waisted" body closely resembling the Baroque guitar, which is the direct ancestor of the modern classical and steel-strung acoustic guitars.
Modern guitars come in two basic types; Acoustic guitars descended from the nylon-strungvihuela, cross-braced "classical guitar"which produce their sound primarily through resonance in the body, used today mainly for various chamber music and some Latin styleselectric guitars, and the newerwhich produce their sound by creating an electrical signal that is sent to an amplifier. Both classes can be further subdivided into more specific designs; nylon-strung versus steel-string guitarstrung acoustic, first appearing in the mid-1800s with the development of modern "Xsemi-bracing" techniques by Germanacoustic and solid-American luthiersbody electric guitars, including the well-known C.F. Martindown to individual body shapes and configurations. Steel-string acoustic guitars are used for a wide varietyEach of popular music genres beginning aroundthese produce subtle variations in the American Reconstruction and continuing totone of the present dayinstrument.
The steel-strungelectric guitar is availablefirst began to be seen around 1910 in a varietythe form of body styles, each offering a different toneacoustic guitars with various modifications to add a "pickup" element, that sensed the guitar based onvibrations of the relative difference in spaceguitar and shape between its "upper bout" (the area between the soundholeproduced an electrical signal that could be amplified. The first pickups were borrowed from microphone elements and attached to the basetop of the neck) and "lower bout" (the space betweenguitar to sense the soundhole and bottomvibrations of the guitar, incorporating the bridge)whole instrument. The "Double-Oh" or "Grand Concert" design most closely resembles the nylon-strung classical guitar in appearance and soundThis functioned, with a balanced but somewhat quieter sound than other styles, and is prized by fingerstyle players for its clarityproduced a relatively weak and small, comfortable body shapeartificial-sounding signal. The first pickups designed specifically for guitar were larger "Triple-Oh" or "Grand Auditorium" style increases the size of the lower boutmagnetic inductors, increasingwhich sense the presenceactual vibrations of bass frequencies and also increasing the overall volume; this is a popular style among all types of players for its more well-rounded tone as heard by modern listeners accustomedsteel strings due to added bass, and is a favorite style among players of the Taylor brand of guitars. The "Dreadnought" style was an attempt by C.F. Martin to further increasedisturbances the presence of bass tonesvibration makes in a relatively compact body shape, by drastically reducing the size of the upper boutmagnetic field, inducing a current in favor of the lower bout. The resulting roughly wedge-shaped design has become the most popular overall body shape among modern players, and catapultedwire coil wrapped around the Martin name into prominencemagnet. Meanwhile, Gibson Guitars introduced the competing "Jumbo" body style, of which the J-200 is a classic example; the guitar's overall body size is much larger,These began to be installed on guitars with very pronounced "waisting" between upper and lower boutsthicker reinforced tops, and a large, round lower bout emphasizing bass frequencies. This style is alsoeventually for a favorite among contemporary guitarists, especially in countrynumber of practical reasons, though its large size can make it more difficult for smaller-framed playersguitars began to hold comfortably.
The steel-strung acoustic guitar can be heard in virtually every major genremanufactured from solid planks of contemporary music, being most popular in country-western music andwood beginning in certain styles of rock musicthe late 1940s. While it's utilized by bands acrossMany classic designs from the rock spectrum40s, its use by bands notable for "heavier" rock styles is typically either in "downtempo" songs50s and styles, such as ballads, or in "unplugged" covers of songs originally recorded using highly-distorted electric guitars. Regular use of acoustic guitar instead of or supplementing electric is more common in "cleaner" rock styles such as folk rock, soft rock60s are still widely available today, rockabilly and other "adult contemporary" sub-genreshaving changed very little from their original incarnations.