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Hello,
this weekend I have enjoyed playing in a really nice band of mandolins, guitars and such stringed instruments for folk music of Balkans. One thing I have been noticing for quite some time now is that we miss one very important instrument: "Begeš". It is like a cornerstone of every stringed band for folk songs here in Balkans. It is a variant of double bass.



I was thinking about maybe even building one. So far I've made restorations to few mandolins and tambourines, made one 3-stringed tambourine and one ukulele, but never such a big instrument or the one that requires carving of the front or back plate.
What is also the problem - I don't know what is this instrument called in English (if there is a name) that would help me in construction.
I would be grateful for any help on finding out the name of this instrument. Thanks

I don't know if there is a name for this in English. To me it looks like a fretted Cello, or close enough to, except the bridge height and fingerboard height at the body joint looks lower. I bet you could just build a cello and add a fret board slotted at the appropriate scale length, and adjust that neck geometry. But that's making some big assumptions.

Anyway, the Guild Of American Lutherie quarterly publication has several articles from recent publications documenting at least one build similar to this. It at least shows templates and forms for the various sections of the side. Back articles can be obtained at http://www.luth.org.

Ray