I
The origin of string instruments of the violin family is involved in much obscurity and it would be impossible to discuss here the various theories concerning it which have been stated with more or less plausibility by musical historians.[42] A preponderance of authoritative opinion seems to favor the theory that the direct ancestor of the violin was the Welsh crwth, a sort of harp, which seems to have been played with a bow. Venantius Fortunatus (570 A.D.) mentions this instrument in the much quoted lines: Romanusque lyra plaudit tibi, barbara harpa, Græcus Achillaica, chrotta Britana canat. (‘The Roman praises thee with the lyre, the barbarian sings to thee with the harp, the Greek with the cither, the Briton with the crwth.’) The fact that the old English name for the fiddle was crowd furnishes an etymological argument in favor of the crwth. It is, of course, possible that the idea of using a bow with the small harp was first suggested by some instrument already in existence. The Arabs and other peoples had instruments roughly approximating the violin type. One is inclined, however, to the assumption that the violin was not developed directly from any particular instrument, but came into being rather through the evolution of an idea with which various races experimented independently and simultaneously.
Ignace Paderewski.
After a photo from life (1915).
The immediate forerunner of the violin seems to have been the rebec, of which there is a drawing in an extant manuscript of the ninth century. The Benedictine monk Ofried, in his Liber Evangeliorum of about the same period, mentions the fidula as one of the two bowed instruments then in use, though to what extent the fidula differed from the rebec we are unable to ascertain. In the psalm-book of Notker (d. 1022) there is also a figure of a rebec and a bow. Drawings, written references and bas-reliefs enable us to follow the development of the violin clearly enough from this time on. In the abbey of St. Georges de Boscherville, Normandy, there is preserved a bas-relief which shows a girl dancing on her head to the accompaniment of a band which includes two instruments of the violin type, played with the bow. The Nibelungen Lied speaks of a fiddler who ‘wielded a fiddle-bow, broad and long like a sword,’ and although this epic was completed in the twelfth century it is probably safe to antedate the reference considerably. There is in the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris a crowned figure with a four-stringed violin, and in the Abbey of St. Germain des Près there is a similar relic showing a man with a five-stringed violin and a bow. Both date from the eleventh century. From these and similar evidences it is plain that a violin of a rudimentary type was used extensively in the eleventh century. Its musical possibilities must have been very slight, and probably it was used chiefly to accompany the song or the dance.
As we may deduce from many contemporary references, the troubadours, jongleurs, and minnesingers[43] of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries played a very important part in the development of the violin type of instrument. There is extant, for instance, a manuscript of the period, containing an illustration of a jongleur playing upon a three-stringed instrument very nearly resembling the modern violin. Jerome of Moravia, a Dominican monk of Paris in the thirteenth century, informs us in his Speculum Musices that the two strings of the violin then in use were tuned as follows:
. His Speculum, which is probably the earliest approach to an instruction book for the violin, also contains this very definite indication of the fingering:
Under the influence of the troubadours and minnesingers the popularity of the violin spread rapidly both among professionals and amateur musicians. It was especially popular as an accompaniment to dances. In the Brunswick Chronicle (1203) we read of a clergyman who had his arm struck by lightning while playing for dancers. We may infer from this that it was considered quite a respectable recreation. The Chronicle has the words veddelte (fiddled) and Veddelbogen (fiddle-bow) without any comment, so that they must have been quite familiar terms. A stained glass window, a Parisian manuscript and a miniature painting from a manuscript called Mater Verborum (1202-12) show that the instrument then in use resembled in shape the modern violin. In Ulrich von Lichtenstein’s Frauendienst we read of an orchestra which included two fiddles and which played a lively walking-tune or march for the purpose of charming away the fatigues of the journey. We may gather some idea of the vogue of violin playing during this period from the character of a decree, issued in the year 1261 and now in the archives of Bologna, which forbade the playing of the viol at night in the streets of that city. Despite its great popularity it held a place beside the harp as an instrument worthy of the dignity of a minstrel, as we may gather from an allusion of a French poet about the year 1230:
‘When the cloth was ta’en away
Minstrels strait began to play,
And while harps and viols join
Raptured bards in strains divine,
Loud the trembling arches rung
With the noble deed we sung.’
By this time professional instrumentalists had become a strong class and in various cities had begun the formation of fraternities which did not differ much in essence from our modern musical unions. The first of these, as far as we can discover, was the St. Nicholas Brüderschaft which existed in Vienna as early as 1288.
The many and varied forms and sizes of viols illustrated in manuscripts and elsewhere suggest that the instrument was used in the music of the church. Certainly instruments of some kind (apart from the organ) must have been taken into the church service, else Thomas Aquinas would not have argued against their employment. The church was not very sympathetic toward musicians and its attitude was reflected to a great extent by the world at large. Synods and councils frequently issued decrees against wandering minstrels and in the city of Worms they were even refused the privilege of lodging in or frequenting public houses.
The fourteenth century brought much greater recognition for instrumental art, which grew in popularity and in the favor and patronage of those in high places. When the French jongleurs united in 1321 into the Confrérie de St. Julien des Ménestriers they obtained a charter which called their leaders Rois des ménestriers (later Rois des violins). The same charter alludes to ‘high and low’ instruments, apparently treble and bass rebecs or viols which were played in octaves to each other or perhaps in a primitive sort of counterpoint. Technique must have been very inferior, for musicians in Alsace were required to study only one or two years before taking up music as a profession. Their incomes, on the other hand, were probably substantial, as it is recorded that they were obliged to pay taxes. It is interesting to note at this early period that the city of Basle employed a violinist to play in a public place for the entertainment of the citizens.
So far we have endeavored to trace the progress of violin music through paintings, monuments and fugitive references in manuscripts, decrees and other documents. These references are not on the whole very clear and the nomenclature of early instruments of the violin family is very loose and confused. We know practically nothing about the music composed for these instruments. Their imperfect shape does not suggest music of an advanced kind, nor does it mean that the technique of the time was equal to very exacting demands. The famous blind organist, Conrad Paumann (1410-73), who could play on every instrument, including the violin, has left us in his Orgelbuch several transcriptions of songs which he may have played on the violin as well as on other instruments, and the dances and other pieces of free invention composed for other instruments may also have served as musical material for violinists. But all this is mere surmise.
Relatives of the Violin. Top: Viola de braccia, Pochette, Viola bastarda.
Bottom: Viola da gamba, Violone, Viola d’amore.
Regarding the combination of the violin with other instruments we know that at the end of the fifteenth century there existed in Louvain an ‘orchestra’ composed of a harp, a flute, a viol, and a trumpet. There is recorded an account of another ‘orchestra’ belonging to Duke Hercules in Ferrara, who employed a great number of musicians. It included flutes, trumpets, lutes, trombones, harps, viols and rebecs. We should not assume, however, that all of these instruments were played simultaneously. Each class of instrument had its own part and if all of them played together they must have made noise rather than music. We are also informed that previous to the year 1450 popes and princes employed ‘orchestras’ which combined ‘the voices, organ, and other instruments into the loveliest harmony.’ In spite of the almost entire lack of music for the violin we know that it was a favorite instrument and consequently that the players must have produced on it pleasing music of some kind. Indication of its popularity is found in the works of Fra Angelico (1387-1455), whose famous angel holds a viol in her hands, and in Boccaccio’s novels, where we learn that violin music formed a considerable part of the entertainment of all classes.