GIGA, or JIG, in Music and Dancing, a gay, brisk, sprightly composition, and yet in full measure, as well as the allemand, which is more serious. Menage takes the word to arise from the Italian giga, a musical instrument mentioned by Dante. Others suppose it to be derived from the Teutonic giege, or ghighe, "a fiddle." This is a favourite air in most nations of Europe; its characteristic is duple time, marked $\frac{4}{4}$, or $\frac{3}{8}$: it consists of two strains, without any determinate number of bars.