The bouzouki is a musical instrument with Greek

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

 origin in the lute

Lute

Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....

 family. A mainstay of modern Greek music, the front of the body is flat and is usually heavily inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The instrument is played with a plectrum

Plectrum

A plectrum is a small flat tool used to pluck or strum a stringed instrument. For hand-held instruments such as guitars and mandolins, the plectrum is often called a pick, and is a separate tool held in the player's hand...

 and has a sharp metallic sound, reminiscent of a mandolin

Mandolin

A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...

 but pitched lower. There are two main types of bouzouki. The three-course with three pairs of strings (known as courses) and the four-course having four pairs of strings.
Bouzouki in Turkish means "broken (from ), not functioning, modified." Here it is used in order to specify the size of the instrument, because of its modified (not proper) nature.