My latest renaissance lute

[Dusepo]

A 7 course renaissance lute I just completed. By request of customer, this is fretted in 1/6 comma meantone and with an extra wooden fret on the 4th course between nut and 1st fret.

[journeybear]

Beautful work, as always! Curious - what is the purpose of that min-fret? It's so close to the main fret. Intonation?

[Jonathan Ward]

Another great instrument! No on can accuse you of not being productive.

[Dusepo]

Beautful work, as always! Curious - what is the purpose of that min-fret? It's so close to the main fret. Intonation?

Exactly correct - intonation. The 1/6 comma meantone fretting means that particular note is one of the most 'out-of-tune', so this is a compromise the customer asked for.

[journeybear]

Intriguing. The modern approach for dealing with intonation issues on mandolins involves introducing compensation into the bridge, differing amounts for each course. I see your lute has a straight bridge - which I assume is historically correct. Would a compensated bridge have successfully addressed the problem? Or would that have been too far from historical accuracy?