The oud ((/uːd/)) is a short-neck lute-type, pear-shaped stringed instrument (a chordophone in the Hornbostel-Sachs classification of instruments) with today 11 or 13 strings grouped in 5 or 6 courses, commonly used in Arabian, Greek, Turkish, Byzantine, Persian, Armenian, North African (Chaabi, Classical, and Spanish Andalusian), Somali and Middle ...