The Konghou and The Huqin in China

Konghou，an ancient stringed instrument，originated in Mesopotamia.

In China，konghou was first produced in the Western Han Dynasty in the form of a bow-shaped instrument after an ancient Chinese model.Accord-ing to both Shi Ji（Records of the Historian）and Han Shu（History of the Han Dynasty），the Han Emperor Wudi ordered Hou Diao，a musician，to make konghou as an instrument to be used at a ceremony marking the conquest of Nanyue（Viet Nam）.

The instrument made by Hou Diao was named konghou，because such an instrument had been used by the aris-tocracy of the Kong State（Cambodia）.It was believed that this instrument was first introduced to China via India probably deriving its horizontal bow-shaped structure from a Mesopotamian model.

Huqin

Principally used as accompanying instrument for Beijing Opera，Jing-Hu is another important two-stringed fiddle in the Huqin family.It was de-veloped in the Qing Dynasty（around 1790），which is often called the Hu-qin.

The pitch of Jing-Hu is the highest among all instruments of the Huqin family.Due to its forceful and clarion timbre，Jing-Hu is suitable almost ex-clusively for Beijing opera.

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