There have been stringed instruments since prehistoric times. Generally a combination of strings under tension amplified by a tortoise shell or box of some kind. Ancient Greek lyres, Celtic lyre-harps, lutes of various sizes (actually, mandolins are descendants of small lutes), et al.

The first instrument to actually look like a guitar—and be called a guitar—is now known as a "Renaissance guitar." It was a bit larger than a baritone ukulele, and had four "courses" or doubled strings—although the string that was highest in pitch was single (called the "chanterelle"). Generally, it was tuned like the top four strings of a modern guitar, but about a fourth higher. It was generally looked down on by lute-players (the lute being the "serious" instrument of the era) as the instrument for non-musical young ladies to "strum on." Hence, Vermeer's famous painting of "The Guitar Player."

Alonzo Mudarra (1510–1580), was the first composer to write serious music for the instrument. Lute players wondered why he "wasted his time writing for such a frivolous instrument." However—

Here is a Renaissance guitar being played:   CLICKY.

About 1600, the guitar was enlarged a bit, inlay work and the bridge and rosette were fancied up a bit, and a fifth course was added to the guitar. It was tuned like the top five strings of a modern guitar. This was known as the Baroque guitar, here played by Seattle's own Elizabeth CD Brown, who graduated from the guitar program at the University of Washington, does about 50 concerts a year on various kinds of guitars, and teaches at Pacific Lutheran University. CLICKY.

It was sometime around 1750 that the guitar was modified again. Instead of five "courses," it had six single strings which were tuned like the modern guitar. This was the instrument that many famous virtuoso guitar players and composers such as Fernando Sor played and wrote music for. Ms. Brown with her Romantic guitar.

Antonio de Torres Jurado (Almería, Andalucía 13 June 1817 – 19 November 1892) was a Spanish guitarist and luthier, and "the most important Spanish guitar maker of the 19th century." Torres enlarged the guitar somewhat and developed the fan-bracing system now used by modern top-quality classical guitars.

Almost all acoustic guitars in use today are derivatives of his designs.

So I'm afraid that the claim that Robert F. Flemming Jr. "invented the guitar" in the 1880s doesn't quite wash.

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Interesting to note in the light of the deprecating remark that Renaissance lute players made when the guitar first appeared, when I first decided to enroll in the University of Washington School of Music in 1957, I had been warned by a jazz musician friend attending the school not to mention that my main interest was in folk music, because I wouldn't be taken seriously. So I said that my interest was in classical guitar. Their attitude was that the guitar, classic or otherwise, was in the same category as the kazoo or tissue paper and comb. No dice. This, despite the fact that Segovia had been to Seattle several times and a couple of months before I tried to register, John Williams had played a concert in Meany Hall, on the U. of W. campus.

Fortunately, Professor John Verrall intervened in my behalf, and I was admitted.

The University of Washington School of Music now has a guitar department, headed by Micharl Partington, and from which Elizabeth Brown graduated.

I like to think that I helped knock a few bricks out of the wall.

Don Firth