Although instruments similar to the guitar have been used throughout the world for centuries, if not millennia, the modern guitar traces its beginning at the end of the 19th century in Europe. The Spanish carpenter turned musical instrument maker Antonio Torres Jurado is credited with developing the first modern acoustic guitar as it is known today around 1850.
He used a design made by an Italian named Gaetano Vinaccia, a renowned luthier who lived and worked in the 17th century and refined it by expanding the base, as well as by focusing on the soundboard and turning the acoustic guitar into a mainstream instrument.