My man, didn't I literally say "No offense,"? I'm pretty sure I did.

And I'm pretty sure Chauncer and Shakespeare won't outlive me, since they already died.

But whatever, this is a discussion about a single perceived misuse of a single word. And at this point I'm getting confused. So, do you agree it was a lute or not? This is what the discussion is about (I think). At least that was my intention from the start. Because I distinctly remember this little story about Emperor Nero having a lute in it, not a fiddle. Although there are versions of the story that say it was a cithara. And a cithara isn't either a lute or a fiddle.

Also. The article you linked kind of makes it sound like it isn't talking about an instrument at all. Maybe, possibly, Nero fiddled his diddle while Rome burned. There's still an instrument involved, just not a musical one. Not conventionally anyway.

And no. I'm not reading the whole article. Not because I don't care enough to do so (although that is true, I don't), but because I don't have the attention span to read an article about a misqote of a fake story.

And again, no offense. I mean what I say as literally as I can. I am terrible at speaking to people. And honest. People don't like that, usually. As a token of friendship, please accept this funny picture of a drink that I have found (I found the picture, not the drink).

I really don't know how else to diffuse the situation. 🙂