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Scan 86
An Encyclopedia of the Violin, 1925
22 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. Printed page 60. See the scan on archive.org.
1The violoncello, which is tuned an octave below the viola, doubles the violin in its dimensions.
3The double bass is approximately twice the size of the violoncello.
5It seems worth while adding to these general proportions assigned the string instruments, some information given by August Otto, a distinguished and skillful violin maker, of Halle, Saxony, published in a pamphlet issued in 1817, under the title of "An Essay on the Construction and Preservation of String Instruments."
7"It is certain that the perfection of the violins built by famous makers is due to the fact that these genuine artist-craftsmen built their instruments according to plain and simple rules, established on a mathematical foundation, and without varying the proportions of their sound boards and backs. These proportions were fixed as follows:
9The thickest part of the belly was that found beneath the bridge, between the two F-holes. In moving away, toward the sides, its thickness continued to decrease, in such wise that it was no more than half that of the belly in the places where the latter rests on the ribs and the moulds.
11In the length of the instrument the thickness of the belly was preserved throughout the entire lengthwise extension of the bass-bar, finally coming to an end toward the upper molds and the lower molds in a thickness which was exactly half the thickness of the belly.
13In their breadth it would appear that the cheeks of these instruments were only one-fourth as thick as their bellies.
15These proportions are the sole ones which are capable of giving a violin the strength, brilliancy and sweetness of tone desired for the instrument. The backs of these violins had the same proportions at all points, save that most of them had backs which were somewhat thicker than the bellies."
17Hieronymus Amati, the oldest of the Cremona makers, secured the greatest beauty in the plane-wood instruments he built, and, so far as we know, the greater number of his backs were constructed of a single piece of wood. These plane-wood backs were lowered a little from left to right.
19His violins were large in shape, and were very agreeable to the eye. Their corners were very short, and their edges extended but very slightly beyond the ribs, which gave the instrument a most handsome appearance. The sides were very thick and perfectly rounded, as is the case with all the Italian instruments, and the purfling, very well made, was large in size.
21The arch of Amati's instruments was somewhat more elevated than that of the Stradivarius violins; it rose from the groove in which the purfling is located in such an imperceptible manner that one would never believe it rose to the height of an inch (twenty-eight millimeters) above the horizontal line of the side, in view of the fact that it appears quite flat to the eye. The
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