noun (n)

• a musical stringed instrument with strings stretched over a flat sounding board; it is laid flat and played with a plectrum and with fingers(noun.artifact)

  Synonym:
  cither, zithern
  

  source: wordnet30
• An instrument of music used in Austria and Germany. It has from thirty to forty wires strung across a shallow sounding-board, which lies horizontally on a table before the performer, who uses both hands in playing on it. [Not to be confounded with the old lute-shaped cittern, or cithern.](noun)

  source: webster1913