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Scan 76
The Hawley Collection of violins, 1904
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 46. See the scan on archive.org.
1THE HAWLEY COLLECTION OF VIOLINS
3evidence of M. Vidal. Little is known regarding Nicola's early years, save that he was the son of a well-to-do craftsman, and enjoyed such advantages of education as were accorded to boys of his class. Not later than 1612, at the age of 16, he must have begun his apprenticeship in the shop of his father and uncle. So it will be seen that he was beginning his life work at the time the first settlements in New England were being made. It is a fact worthy of contemplation, illustrative of the durability of the violin, that, frail thing that it is, there are to-day specimens of Nicola Amati's handiwork (of which the Goding Amati of the Hawley collection is one), in a far more perfect state of preservation than the tombstones which mark the graves of the early settlers of Massachusetts Colony. It was very natural for him to copy the style of his father's work rather than that of Antonio, his uncle, and therefore his early violins closely resemble those of his father. When Gerolamo Amati died, in 1635, Nicola was thirty-nine years of age. The date of the death of his uncle, Antonio, is not known. Some place it about the same year as his brother's. As before stated, Lancetti affirms that he worked as late as 1648. Mr. John Bishop, in his translation of Jacob Augustus Otto's book, speaks of two violins bearing dates of 1648 and 1691, belonging to a Dr. Sommerville, of Stafford, which were called to his attention by a Rev. Mr. Elwin, who considered them genuine. M. Vidal, of Paris, in his celebrated work on the violin, also mentions them and reproduces their labels, stating in regard to them, "Que nous avons tout lieu de croire authentiques." It is obvious that the whole thing is an error. No doubt Methuselah lived long enough to have made violins in his 150th year, had there been a pressing local demand for them in his day, but even the violin-makers of Cremona were not blessed with such longevity, so we must reluctantly conclude that both the Rev. Mr. Elwin and M. Vidal were imposed upon. Supposing the death of Gerolamo to have occurred in 1635, and that of Antonio a few years later, it will be rational to assume that Nicola began to label his instruments with his own name about the same time, succeeding in fact to the business.
5Nicola's first work was very much like his father's, in respect to size, model, varnish, and style of workmanship. For the following period of ten years his work shows that, by means of constant experiment and research, he was gradually evolving those grand pattern violins upon which his fame was chiefly to rest. The length of his early or small pattern violin is 13 3-4, sometimes 1-16 over, with proportionate upper and lower bouts. From this time until his death he was the undisputed master of the violin situation in Italy, there was no other maker who could rank with him. For this reason, naturally, he was the teacher sought by young men wishing to acquire a thorough knowledge of the violin-making art. His fame, as far as the violin world was concerned, spread to the furthermost parts of Europe; he had apprentices not only from Italy but from Germany, Holland, France, and other countries. Of some of these there is record, of the others, we must judge by their work and from their labels, for in not a few cases they signed themselves "alumnus Nicola Amati." Andrea Guarneri seems to have been in very close personal relation with the family of Amati, more so than any other apprentice, even Stradivari, for his name appears in the income tax returns of Nicola, no doubt because of the fact that he lived in the house of Amati. Heinrich Jacobs came from Amsterdam to spend a few years at the bench of the great master. He was a very skillful workman and prob-
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