You were first seen in a painting in the Trois Freres cave circa 13,000 B.C. in what in now France. Like all beautiful women, over centuries you changed shapes, styles, names. You became lyres, then lutes. You played dyads and chords. The Persians callrd you "barbat." The Arabs called you "oud." When the Moors flocked to Iberia, they brought you along. You spread to Provence
where you influenced troubadors and eventually the rest of Europe. But wherever you traveled, whatever evolutions you underwent, you always retained your sonorous tones. You became the French "mandore. You became the German "mandoer." You became the Spanish "vandola." You became the Italiam "mandola." Your path was tortuous. Eventually, though, you became the mandolin, but you still had highs and lows. Your first high was in 1744. Your first low was the end of the Napoleonic Wars of 1815. Your next high was the Paris Exposition of 1878. And further, from the late 19th Century through the early years of the 20h Century, was the "GoldenAge" of the mandolin. But after World War I, the mandolin gradually sufferred another decline supplanted by the advent of Jazz. You, a mandolin, beautiful women you have always been, have lived a long, long life, and it's not over yet. You contine to bring beautiful, musical sounds to all music lovers around the world. Your lovely life may never end.
Copyright 2020 Tod Howard Hawks
A graduate of Andover and Columbia College, Columbia University, Tod Howard hawks has been a poet, anovelist, and a human-rights advocate his entire adult life.