Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A single-stringed instrument of the Balkans, often played with a bow and used to accompany epic poems.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

See the etymology of gusle.

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Examples

  • At the back of the room sat a handsome young man playing the gusla and singing, apparently the proprietor, and two very pretty young women, all with that characteristically Slav look which comes from the pulling of the flesh down from the flat cheekbones by the tense pursing of the mouth.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part V 1969

  • The man behind us stopped playing his gusla, as if he understood what had been said.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part V 1969

  • The man behind us stopped playing his gusla, as if he understood what had been said.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part V 1941

  • At the back of the room sat a handsome young man playing the gusla and singing, apparently the proprietor, and two very pretty young women, all with that characteristically Slav look which comes from the pulling of the flesh down from the flat cheekbones by the tense pursing of the mouth.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part V 1941

  • In this small Moslem cabaret I think there was nobody more opulent than a small shopkeeper, but the performers numbered a male gypsy who sang and played the gusla, a very beautiful Serbian singer, a still more beautiful gypsy girl who sang and danced, and this danseuse de ventre, who was called Astral When Astra came round and rattled the plate at our table I found she was a Salonica Jewess, member of another colony of refugees from Ferdinand and Isabella who still speak Spanish, and I asked her to come and see me the next day at my hotel and give me a lesson in the danse de ventre.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part IV 1969

  • In this small Moslem cabaret I think there was nobody more opulent than a small shopkeeper, but the performers numbered a male gypsy who sang and played the gusla, a very beautiful Serbian singer, a still more beautiful gypsy girl who sang and danced, and this danseuse de ventre, who was called Astral When Astra came round and rattled the plate at our table I found she was a Salonica Jewess, member of another colony of refugees from Ferdinand and Isabella who still speak Spanish, and I asked her to come and see me the next day at my hotel and give me a lesson in the danse de ventre.

    Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: Part IV 1941

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