For years, as I’ve taught hundreds of beginning students the various parts of the ukulele on their first day, I’ve speculated on why the nut on the ukulele is called a ‘nut.’ If you’re unfamiliar with the term, the ‘nut’ is the piece of bone (or dense plastic) near the head stock that has grooves cut in it in which the strings rest before traveling up the neck, over the saddle and attaching to the bridge.

Nut? Why nut? When talking to my students, my speculation always runs something like this: “I have no idea why this piece is called a nut. Maybe someone took a nut one day, cut a groove in it and stretched a string through the groove to make a simple string instrument.” It would work, and you could slide the nut to different positions to change the pitch, but is this the origin of the term? Who knows.

Wikipedia states, “The word may have come from the German Nut (pronounced “noot”), meaning groove or slot. The nut, however, is called a de:Sattel (“saddle”; also Obersattel) in German, whereas the part of a guitar known as the saddle in English, the surface of the bridge on which the strings rest, is called a de:Stegeinlage or Steg, in German.”

According to this, the origin may have been German, but the Germans call it something else? Hmm. Sounds like a stretch to me. So, I guess I’ll go on speculating with my students about notches cut in nuts. Maybe some day I’ll grab a nice hazelnut and cut my own notch and make a simple canjo or something. 🙂

Post filed under All UkulelePlay! Blog Posts, Ukulele Education.