The British Museum is the jewel of the picturesque Bloomsbury district of London. Just inside the main entrance is a new covered atrium and courtyard with the new modern library structure in its center. To view the museum in its entirity, you must set aside the whole day. The collections are extensive, and the rooms and passageways are cavernous.

One of the main reasons for my going was to see the Sutton Hoo remains. A 6th-7th century buried Saxon ship was found in Sutton Hoo, East Anglia, in the river mud several kilometers in from the east coast. One discovery was pieces of a musical instrument known as a rote. It is a six-string lyre similar to those found in Germany, but with a rounded shape instead of the traditional y-shaped lyre configuration.
The photo on the left is all that remained of the Saxon rote. The outline drawn around the pieces shows the relative size as compared to the imprint in the mud when it was found.
This photo shows a reproduction of the Saxon rote. It is barely 1" thick and hollowed out from a single piece of wood. The most common wood available in the 6th and 7th centuries was oak. The top might have been "tacked" on with the same wood or with a lighter wood like spruce or pine. There are no soundholes. The bridge, sort of castle shaped, was bone or hard wood. This particular instrument was strung with gut.
This is my reproduction of the same instrument. I used a figured maple for the body, Douglas fir for the top, ebony for the medalions, and maple for the tailpiece, bridge, and pegs. It is nylon strung.