Catgut

Catgut is a type of cord that is prepared from the natural fibre found in the walls of animal intestines. Catgut makers usually use sheep or goat intestines, but occasionally use the intestines of cattle,hogs, horses, mules, or donkeys. Despite the name, catgut manufacturers do not use cat intestines.

Etymology

The word catgut may have been an abbreviation of the word "cattlegut". Alternatively, it may derive by folk etymology from kitgut or kitstring—the word kit, meaning fiddle, having at some point been confused with the word kit for a young cat.

Production

To prepare catgut, workers clean the small intestines, free them from fat, and steep them in water. Then they scrape off the external membrane with a blunt knife, and steep the intestines again for some time in potassium hydroxide. Then they smooth and equalize the intestines by drawing them out. Lean animals yield the toughest gut. Next, they twist the prepared gut strands together to make string. String diameter is determined by the thickness of the individual guts, and by the number used. A thin string, such as a violin E, uses only three or four guts, whereas a double bass string may use twenty or more. After twisting and drying, workers polish the strings to the required diameter.