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Scan 48
Old Violins And Their Makers, 1883
4 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 34. See the scan on archive.org.
1tickets dating after 1638 for Jerome (Hieronymus), and 1635 for Antonius and Hieronymus united, are either fabrications or are tickets abstracted by some of their pupils, and utilised by them or by others at these later dates. It does not, of course, follow that the violins bearing these tickets are spurious, but the probabilities are strongly against their being genuine. A genuine violin will sell readily enough without a ticket, and a genuine ticket will readily enough sell a spurious violin. I have not the slightest doubt in my own mind that tricks of this sort were played often and early, for the parasites who surround all great arts and all great artists in their remunerated days, and who have nothing to live upon but the fame of the people whose names they abuse, are bound by an instinct of self-preservation to seek out the most successful methods of accomplishing their aims. Perhaps these people did not think they were doing any great harm, their fiddles being very faithful copies, in appearance, of the masters after whom they were called, and it is on record that a greater man than any one of them did not disdain, when in need, to descend to the same practice. In this case, however—to which I shall refer later on—it was as if Rafaelle had forged Da Vinci's name or Angelo that of Del Sarto.
3The violins of Antonius Amati were made after the model of his father's—Brescian in type—having a sweet and mellow tone; the first and second strings being the best, the third and fourth weak and dull. Those made by the brothers in association rank very high. The workmanship is of a most finished kind and the wood well chosen, that for the breast being very close in the
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