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Scan 43
Old Violins And Their Makers, 1883
2 lines. Read by computer on 30 September 2026. Printed page 29. See the scan on archive.org.
1Salabue, and was afterwards at Milan, there was a ticket bearing his name, and the date, 1546; and from that circumstance, accepting the instrument and ticket as genuine, the conjecture has been formed that he was born somewhere in the first twenty years of this sixteenth century. The date of his death is also unknown, but it is supposed to have happened about 1580, as, after this year, instruments bearing the name of Amati belong to his sons, Hieronymus and Antonius. From these data the period of activity of Andreas Amati is reckoned to be from 1520 to 1580. His violins were of small and medium size, very strongly arched towards the middle of the instrument, the varnish somewhat thick and of a clear brown or brown-yellow, and it is sometimes transparent. The sound holes are not unlike those of Maggini, ordinary ribs and nicely made corners; but, although he is supposed to have made many violins, time and accident seem to have destroyed great numbers of them, if not all. In the South Kensington Exhibition a violoncello by Andreas, bearing date 1572, was shown, and the only other instruments by this maker recorded as having been seen are a viola bastarda in the possession of the Baron Bagge before mentioned, in 1788, and two violins of the collection of twenty-four of various sorts made for Charles IX., of France, which disappeared from the Chapel Royal during the first French Revolution. These two were discovered a few years later by M. Cartier, a violinist, the finish of the workmanship being described as remarkable, and their tone full of charm. The date at which these instruments were seen is very remote, and there appears to be no trace of them now. It is not, however, at all unlikely that many of Andreas Amati's
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