{{Short description|Stringed instrument used by Irish and British musicians}} {{multiple| {{more citations needed|date=January 2026}} {{cleanup lang|date=January 2026}}}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2026}}
The '''tiompán''' (Irish), '''tiompan''' (Scottish Gaelic), or '''timpan''' (Welsh) was a stringed musical instrument<ref name="Buckley_1977">{{cite book |last=Buckley |first=Ann |title=Jahrbuch fur Musikalische Volks- und Völkerkunde |year=1977 |volume=9 |pages=53–88 |chapter=What was the Tiompán? A Problem in Ethnohistorical Organology. Evidence in Irish Literature}}</ref> used by musicians in medieval Ireland and Britain.
The word 'timpán' was of both masculine and feminine gender in classical Irish. It is theorised to derive from the Latin word 'tympanum' (tambourine or kettle drum) and 'timpán' does appear to be used in certain ancient texts to describe a drum. Drum names applied to stringed instruments is not unheard of, such as tambour owing its name ultimately to the Persian تنبور (tambūr). Both Tympanum and Tambūr could be cognate with πανδοῦρα (pandoûra).<ref>{{cite dictionary |title=The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language |date=2016 |isbn=978-0-544-45445-3}}</ref> However, the tiompán is also thought to have been a kind of lyre, others contest it was a long-necked lute.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |year=2013 |title=Timpán/Tiompán |encyclopedia=The Encyclopaedia of Music in Ireland |publisher=University College Dublin Press |location=Dublin |last=McCarthy |first=Darina |editor-last=White |editor-first=Harry |page=987 |editor-first2=Barra |editor-last2=Boydell}}</ref> Medieval writings on the tiompan have listed it as distinguished from "nine-stringed cruits", and that the tiompan commonly had three strings. These sources also make references to the tips and sides of the fingers being used on the strings, likely to stop them to produce higher notes. Whether all strings were stopped or just the top string, as with sitar or saz playing, is unknown. Sources give reference to the strings being metal, often bronze, and given the period to which tiompans are extant, resonating the strings by plucking is more likely than by bowing them.<ref name="Buckley_1977"/> There is a high chance the name was reapplied to other intstruments during the Early Modern Period. The adjective "timpánach" referred to a performer on the instrument but is also recorded in one instance in the ''Dánta Grádha'' as describing a cruit. The feminine noun "timpánacht" referred to the art or practice of playing the tiompán.
In modern Irish traditional music, the word tiompan was used by Derek Bell, after Francis William Galpin's theories, to refer to the hammered dulcimer. Other hypothesised reproductions resemble the Welsh Crwth, and the ancient Greek and Roman Pandura.<ref>{{cite web |date=9 May 2020 |title=Shadows of the tiompán's strings |url=https://greywolf.druidry.co.uk/2020/05/shadows-of-the-tiompans-strings/ |website=Greywolf's Lair}}{{self-published source|date=January 2026}}</ref>
Recorded players included Maol Ruanaidh Cam Ó Cearbhaill (murdered 1329). Finn Ó Haughluinn (died 1490) was the last recorded player of the instrument.
==See also== * Rotte (lyre)
==References== {{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:An Tiompan Gaidhealach}} Category:Composite chordophones Category:Medieval history of Ireland Category:Culture of medieval Scotland Category:Harps Category:Irish musical instruments Category:Music of Scotland