The kopuz is the oldest stringed instrument of the Turkic peoples: the body hollowed from a single piece of wood, the face covered with hide, the strings made of horsehair. In the Dede Korkut tellings the kopuz is sacred — nobody harms a person carrying one.
When the bard recites, the kopuz does not merely accompany: it holds the breath of the telling, because a long story is remembered by its rhythm. The Kazakh dombra, the Kyrgyz komuz and the Anatolian bağlama are all of the same family.
In Balbal, The Bards' Night is the twelfth floor of the Middle World: half dark, the hearth the only light, and a bonus for matching in time with the rhythm.
See also: otağ