FOOTNOTES:
[1] M. Cartier, Musicien de la Chapelle du Roi, announced for publication, several years ago, an “Essai Historique sur le Violon, et sur les progrès de l’Art Musical, depuis le moyen age.” This announcement was accompanied by the following observations:—“An Historical Essay upon the Violin may, at first sight, appear to many to possess but little interest. They will not readily believe that it is capable of exciting their liveliest curiosity, and of presenting an object of real utility, inasmuch as an attempt will be made to lead the mind from the mere mechanism of the art to a moral and scientific view of the subject, and to a consideration how far the beau idéal of music is indebted to the violin. The author proves that this instrument was unknown to the ancients, and derives its origin from the Druids of Gaul, from whom it afterwards passed to the bards of Scotland—that, from this obscure beginning, it made its way through the dark ages, with slow but certain success, till the beginning of the 17th century, when it attained the first rank among instruments.”—(Harmonicon, 1827.) I have not been able to discover whether this promised treatise has yet seen the light. The idea of tracing the instrument to the Druids of Gaul seems more romantic than rational; but it would be something gained for la gloire de la France, could such a theory be substantiated.
[2] In England, during the time here referred to, the instruments of the viol class were so much in favour that every considerable family had, as a necessary part of its establishment, a complete chest of viols, that is to say, a treble, tenor and bass-viol, each played with a bow, and bearing such proportion to one another as do the modern violin, tenor and violoncello.
[3] “Memoirs of the Musical Drama.”
[4] M. Baillot makes a somewhat longer draft upon the past tense; for he states, that for nearly three hundred years back there has been no change in the structure of the violin.—Introduction to the “Méthode de Violon du Conservatoire.”
[5] They who enjoy the advantage of access to curious books may see a figure of a Provençal Fiddler in “Diez, Poesie der Troubadour.” Viol was the old Norman French name for the fiddle used by the minstrels of the middle ages, which was furnished variously with 3, 4, 5, or 6 strings. Viula was the Provençal term—and arson, or arçon, for the bow.
[6] “It is a kinde of disparagement to be a cunning fiddler.”—Feltham.
[7] The lute, of which hardly the shape, and still less the sound, are now known, was, during the 16th and 17th centuries, the favourite chamber instrument of every nation in Europe.
[8] According to Strutt, the name of fiddlers was applied to the minstrels as early, at least, as the 14th century. “It occurs (says that writer) in the Vision of Pierce the Ploughman, where we read, ‘not to fare as a fydeler, or a frier, to seke feastes.’ It is also used, but not sarcastically, in the poem of Launfel:—