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Scan 206
Old Violins And Their Makers, 1883
4 lines. Read by computer on 30 September 2026. Printed page 192. See the scan on archive.org.
1of them was contemporary with himself and another not very ancient), for he immediately adds, "These were old, but we have now very excellent good workmen who, no doubt, can work as well as those if they be so well paid for their work as they were." Whether the older and large English viols were imported direct from Italy or elsewhere, and those named were the earliest viol makers or not, is not at present certainly known, for Mace makes no further allusion to them, nor does he even tell us who were those who "could work as well," and he is, besides, the only source as yet discovered from whence this slender information comes, with the exception of the following advertisement, which appears in a collection of airs, entitled Tripla Concordia, published in 1667, by John Carr: "There is two chests of viols to be sold, one made by Mr. John Ross, who formerly lived in Bridewell, containing two trebles, three tenors, and one basse. The chest was made in the year 1598. The other being made by Mr. Henry Smith, who formerly lived over against Hatton house, in Holbourn, containing two trebles, two tenors, two basses; the chest was made in the year 1633. Both chests are very curious work." This advertisement, which, if accurate, fixes dates for two of the above makers, is given in a note appended to North's "Memoires of Musick," by the learned Dr. Rimbault, who first published this work in 1846.
3Although Thomas Mace appears to be the first English writer on musical matters in whose pages we find authoritative reference to the violin, there are other notices of its appearance in England in connection with the Royal Band, in 1561, and ten years later; but it is
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