Books › The instruments of the modern orchestra & early records of the precursors of the violin family : with over 500 illustrations and plates, 1910 › scan 173
Scan 173
The instruments of the modern orchestra & early records of the precursors of the violin family : with over 500 illustrations and plates, 1910
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 109. See the scan on archive.org.
1was identical with the guitar-fiddle until the moment when the bow was applied to the latter, then it rapidly developed into vielle, viol, violin; while the guitar remained practically stationary. The steps in the evolution of the guitar-fiddle from the cithara may be seen in the musical instruments found among the drawings illustrating the Utrecht Psalter, 6th to 8th cent. (See Part II. "The Precursors of the Violin Family.")
3The instruments with vaulted sound-chests, the rebab, rebec, crwth, crowd, rott, gigue, need not be taken into consideration; they reached no modern development and are now extinct (the lute and mandoline are directly derived from Arab instruments of the same date as the rebab), further, they did not possess a single feature of the violin not already shown in the cithara.
5The first steps towards the production of the violin are ascribed by some to Gaspar Duiffoprugcar, or Tieffenbruecker, as he was called in his native country, the Tyrol (1500-1560); he lived successively in Bologna, Paris and Lyons; his violins were much prized for their beautiful tone, and are now very rare. Others name Gasparo da Salo as the inventor of the first modern violin at the end of the 16th century. It is, however, from Cremona that we get the perfect instrument from the hands of the Amati family (1592-1682); the Stradivari (1644-1737), and the Guarneri (1630 to about 1695). The first solos for the violin were written by Biagio Marini in the middle of the 17th century. Monteverde was the first to assign to the violin its proper place as leader and to give to the strings a prominent position in the balance of the orchestra. In modern orchestras of average size, there are from 18 to 38 violins divided into firsts and seconds.
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