Hurdy-gurdy twenty-three different forms, and there is still no standardized design today. The six-stringed French "vielle à roue" is the best known and most common sort. A number of regional forms developed, but outside France the instrument was considered a folk instrument and there were no schools of construction that could have determined a standard form. There are two primary body styles for contemporary instruments: guitar-bodied and lute-backed. Both forms are found in French-speaking areas, while guitar-bodied instruments are the general form elsewhere. The box form of the "simphonia" is also commonly found among players of early music and historical re-enactors.
Vielle à roue et à manche The instrument has also been mislabeled "strohfiddel" in modern times, since the caption at the bottom of Plate XXII uses this term (literally "straw fiddle"), but that term actually refers to the xylophone pictured next to the dulcigurdy. Praetorius does not appear to give a specific name for the instrument, instead lumping it in with the keyed hurdy-gurdy next to it as "Bauern-Lyren" or "peasant lyres." Vielle à roue et à manche The vielle à roue et à manche (called dulcigurdy by some luthiers) is a modern term for an early music instrument, of unknown original name, of the hurdy-gurdy