Germany · Instrument making; Lutherie; Bavarian heritage
Bayerischer Zitherbau
The making of the concert zither (Konzertzither) — the Alpine plucked string instrument with 4–5 melody strings over a fretted fingerboard and 29–37 open accompaniment strings across the soundboard, whose specific acoustic character is defined as the defining sound of Bavarian and Austrian Alpine music. The Bavarian Zithermacher reads the correct soundboard thickness for the Zither's characteristic sustained, resonant tone through a multi-point tap sequence related to the guitar tap-tune family (CRAFT-1018, CRAFT-1112) but adapted to the zither's unique combination of a fretted melody string area and an extensive open accompaniment string area requiring different acoustic properties across a single resonating surface.
Risk level: Vulnerable · Not listed; the Mittenwald violin and string instrument making tradition is on the German national ICH inventory
The making of Nürnberger Lebkuchen — the most internationally recognized German Christmas confectionery, protected by IGP since 1996 and produced exclusively in Nuremberg (Nürnberg).
The conservation and polishing tradition for historic full plate armor (Plattenharnisch) in the Augsburg context — the city that was alongside Milan the most celebrated European armor production center of the 15th–16th centuries, supplying…
The traditional Bavarian pottery tradition of the Hafner (stove fitter-potter — a professional who historically both made tiles for decorated ceramic stoves Kachelofen and threw functional stoneware) — one of Germany's oldest documented…
The cultivation and winemaking of Mosel Riesling from the dramatically steep blue-slate (Devonian Hunsrück schist) vineyard terraces of the Mosel Valley — one of the world's most extreme viticultural landscapes, where hand-harvesting on…
The brewing of Kölsch — the only beer style in the world protected by a geographical indication (the Kölsch Konvention of 1986) that also specifies the serving vessel: a 0.2L cylindrical glass called a Stange, served exclusively in…
The making of Eau de Cologne — the light citrus-herb fragrance invented in Cologne in the early 18th century by Italian-born Johann Maria Farina (1685–1766), who named it after his home city of Cologne and established the world's oldest…
The hand-building of Guatemala's national instrument, a genuinely Afro-Indigenous syncretic tradition in which enslaved Africans introduced the sub-Saharan xylophone-and-gourd-resonator concept to Central America from the 16th century…
The Jarai people of Ratanakiri Province maintain a bronze gong casting and tuning tradition closely related to the Vietnamese Central Highlands gong traditions (shared cultural heritage across the Cambodia-Vietnam border).
A diatonic, single-row xylophone of the mestizo peoples of Nicaragua's Pacific region, distinguished from every other marimba tradition documented in this archive by its performance posture: a curved wooden bow (arco), traditionally made…
The sinking, marking, cutting, and hammer-tuning of 55-gallon industrial oil drums into the steelpan — the only entirely new family of acoustic instruments invented in the 20th century, and Trinidad and Tobago's national instrument.
The koto (琴/箏) is Japan's national instrument — a 13-stringed zither 180cm in length produced from paulownia (桐 kiri) wood.
The making of the paired (sometimes triple) Garifuna hand drums — primera and segunda, occasionally joined by a tercera — hollowed from a single solid trunk of mahogany or mayflower hardwood, headed with deer, sheep, or pig skin, and…