espanolEl presente articulo consta de dos partes. En la primera se documenta la importancia que tuvo la guitarra barroca (o de cinco ordenes) en el Chile colonial, prestando una atencion especial a Santiago pero incorporando, tambien, referencias novedosas acerca de otras ciudades y pueblos. Esta seccion se apoya en una revision sistematica efectuada por el autor durante varios anos en diversos archivos y colecciones (como el fondo Escribanos de Santiago del Archivo Nacional Historico), que le ha permitido localizar un numero muy significativo de guitarras o instrumentos afines para los siglos XVI a XVIII. En la segunda parte se plantea una nueva hipotesis acerca del origen del guitarron chileno y el canto a lo divino, vinculando estas manifestaciones tradicionales con la practica colonial de acompanar la musica sacra con la guitarra y entonar salmodicamente los textos liturgicos. Para ello se conjugan la evidencia documental proporcionada en la primera seccion, otros datos ineditos respecto de las practicas musico-liturgicas del Chile colonial y la informacion etnografica contenida en estudios previos de diversos autores. De esta forma se intenta vincular de manera convincente una musica del pasado, de tradicion predominantemente escrita como la de la Colonia, con una musica actual, de tradicion predominantemente oral como el canto a lo divino. EnglishThis article is divided into two parts. In the first part the importance of the baroque guitar of five courses in colonial Chile is documented mainly in Santiago (the capital) but also in other cities and villages of the country. The data was gathered by the author after several years of systematic work in different archives and collections such as the Escribanos de Santiago collection at the National Historical Archive. As a result a significant number of guitars and related instruments from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century were identified. The second part presents a new hypothesis about the origin of the Chilean "guitarron" and the traditional vocal practice known as "canto a lo divino". Both probably stemmed from the colonial practice of accompanying sacred music with the guitar while using psalm intonation formulae to sing the liturgical texts. This hypothesis is supported by the data presented in the first part combined with previously unknown data about music and liturgical practices in colonial Chile along with ethnographic data published previously by other scholars. The final purpose is to establish convincing links between the colonial music mainly of written tradition and the present practice of the "canto a lo divino" which belongs mainly to the oral tradition.