The Yi Sanhu is a unique bowed and stringed instrument of the Yi people, and it is the main instrument of the folk music and dance "Axi Jumping to the Moon". It is popular in Yunnan Lunan, Guishan, Maitreya, Huxi and Yiliang inhabited areas of Yi people and Sani people.

The Yi Sanhu is a stringed instrument derived from the Xiqin type.

Since the early Qing Dynasty, with the further consolidation and development of the unified multi-ethnic country, the cultural exchanges between various ethnic groups have become more frequent, resulting in the emergence of many new varieties of stringed instruments.

This kind of Sanhu appeared in the Xianfeng and Tongzhi years of the late Qing Dynasty (1851-1874), and was developed on the basis of the Han bamboo erhu.

body structure
The shape of the Yi Sanhu is similar to that of the Zhonghu, with a larger body. It is composed of the piano barrel, the headstock, the piano rod, the peg, the jin, the bridge, the strings and the bow.

piano
Cylindrical in shape, there are two kinds of bamboo or wood. Bamboo ones are mostly made of moso bamboo or thicker phoenix bamboo; wooden ones are mostly made of whole pieces of chun wood, paulownia wood, water wax gourd wood or panzhihua wood. Empty or spun, both ends are transparent. The drum is 18-25 cm long, 10-16 cm in diameter, and 0.8-1.2 cm thick. The front of the drum is covered with python skin, sheepskin or frog skin. The back end of the drum is open without sound windows. There is a through hole at the bottom for inserting the piano rod.

Headstock, and stem
Cylindrical in shape, made from a single piece of bamboo or wood. Bamboo ones are mostly made of purple bamboo, Fengwei bamboo, white bamboo or dead bamboo; wooden ones are usually made of red toon wood, walnut wood, green bar wood, etc., preferably walnut wood, whose length is the same as the full length of the piano body. 2.2 cm to 2.6 cm in diameter. The headstock has a flat top without decoration, and the upper end of the stem is horizontally set with three axes.

peg
Made of boxwood, maple or ram's horn, the shaft is 18 cm to 22 cm long.

Thousands of pounds
At the third peg, there is a thin rope set, which hangs down to a thousand pounds. The middle part of the piano bar is provided with the silk string, which gathers the strings together, and it is the upper fixed point of the effective string length.

bridge
Made of bamboo, it is placed in the center of the leather surface of the qin barrel, which is the lower end fixing point of the effective string length. The lower end of the piano rod is inserted into the through hole of the piano barrel and exposed outside the barrel.

strings
Zhang three silk or steel strings.

bow
Relatively short, the bow shaft is made of thin bamboo, with a large curvature and a length of 45 cm. The two ends are tied with two ponytails as bow hairs, which are placed between the three strings.