Scan 140
The violin, its famous makers and their imitators, 1887
4 lines. Read by computer on 28 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1to the four quarters of the globe. Little did Andrea imagine that he was destined to be the means of lifting his patronymic of Guarneri to such a giddy height!
3Andrea Guarneri, like Andrea Amati, was the pioneer of the family: but for his influence we might never have had the extraordinary works of his nephew, Giuseppe. How full of interest would the smallest events of Andrea's workshop life prove if we could only ascertain them! We know that in early years he was working in the shop of Niccolò Amati. With what delight would any record, or even anecdote, of those golden days in the history of the Violin be received by the lovers of the instrument! The bare idea that these men were living in daily close converse is sufficient to awaken interest of a lively nature in the mind of a lover of Fiddles. Unhappily, however, no Boswell was at hand to dot down events, of small value when passing, but of great consequence to after time. The want of that direct biographical information which is handed down to us from recorded personal knowledge, leads to the opening of many a mouldy, worm-eaten, and half-forgotten parish register, wherein we read, in language stiff and statutory, accounts of departed parishioners having duly performed and executed divers acts and deeds. These entries often shed much unexpected light on subjects previously dark or obscured. The pages of the Cremonese parish register, to which allusion has been made in the notices of the members of the Amati family, has served this purpose in some measure. From the same source we have a few interesting facts concerning Andrea Guarneri. It appears that Niccolò Amati entered, in the year 1641, the age of his pupil Andrea Guarneri in the parish rate-book as being fifteen years, thus supplying the hitherto unknown date of his birth. Again
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