The area of the music of Pontus constitutes a space to be discovered and explored, to which end this book has been composed. It is a study of the most emblematic of Pontian music�s symbols, the lyre, which is here researched in the entire spectrum of its substance, from organology and technique to the rep- ertory and the role it plays in a tradition still alive. It is written by one of its most active instrumentalists, the lyre-player Michalis Kaliontzidis, eschewing the oft-trodden path of unintegrated and distanced scientific research and bearing witness in this volume to what he has experienced, living through many years of all the multifarious aspects of the art.