What was Leonardo da Vinci’s rotating musical instrument called?

Leonardo da Vinci’s rotating musical instrument was called the viola organista.

Leonardo designed the viola organista in the 15th century. The instrument combined the keyboard layout of an organ or keyboard instrument with the sound-producing principle of a bowed string instrument. Pressing a key would bring a string into contact with a rotating wheel or belt, causing the string to vibrate continuously.

Unlike a conventional violin, the player would not move a bow back and forth by hand. Leonardo made several sketches of related mechanisms, but there is no evidence that he completed a playable instrument during his lifetime. The name “viola organista” is a modern descriptive name associated with the design.

The concept influenced later attempts to create keyboard instruments with sustained bowed-string sounds. In 2013, Polish musician Sławomir Zubrzycki completed and performed on a reconstruction based on Leonardo’s drawings. It is therefore better understood as a family of related designs than as a surviving Renaissance production instrument.