Bow & Bridge Violin and bow makers, as the old books printed them

Books › Notice of Anthony Stradivari, the celebrated violin-maker, known by the name of Stradivarius:, 1864 › scan 47

Scan 47

Notice of Anthony Stradivari, the celebrated violin-maker, known by the name of Stradivarius:, 1864

8 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. Printed page 25. See the scan on archive.org.

1and by the troubadours, must be synonymous with the crouth, whose name was altered, and not, as some have supposed, with the hurdy-gurdy (vielle), the sounds of which are produced by the friction of a wheel; because the name of the latter was symphonie, cifonie, or chifonie. Bottée de Toulmont argues from a passage in the commentary of Notker (a Monk of St. Gall, in the tenth century) on the Creed of Athanasius, a passage quoted both by Du Cange* and by Schilter†, and which poor Bottée does not understand, although the sense is perfectly clear. It refers to the ancient instrument called psalterion, which was mounted with ten strings and had the form of the Greek letter delta (Δ), and which, modified by musicians in its form and in the number of its strings, received the barbarous name of rottat‡. It is evident there is no reference to a bow-instrument in this passage, but to an instrument whose strings are struck or pulled, as was the case with the ancient psalterion or psalterium. There is a decisive passage, in this respect, in the 89th letter of St. Boniface, the Apostle of Germany and Archbishop of Mayence, who lived in the
3* Gloss. ad script. med. et infim. ætatis, ex edit. Henschelli, vol. v, p. 786 et seq. voc. Rocta.
5† Thesaurus Antiq. Teuton, III. Gloss. Teuton, voc. Rotta.
7‡ "Sciendum est quod antiquum psalterium, instrumentum decachordum, utique erat, in hac videlicet deltae litterae figura multipliciter mystica. Sed postquam illud symphoniaci quidam et ludicratores, ut quidam ait, ad suum opus traxerant, formam utique ejus et figuram commoditati suæ habilem fecerant, et plures chordas annectentes et nomine barbarico rottam appellantes, mysticam illam Trinitatis formam transmutando."

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