CHAPTER X.
WOMEN AS VIOLINISTS.
During the past forty or fifty years the violin has become a fashionable instrument for ladies, and has become correspondingly popular as a profession for those who are obliged to earn a living.
Formerly, for many years, it seems to have been considered improper, or ungraceful, or unladylike,—the reasons are nowhere satisfactorily given, but the fact remains that until recently few women played the violin.
From the year 1610 until 1810 the list of those who played in public is extremely short, numbering only about twenty, and of these several were gambists.
That women did, once upon a time, play on the violin, or the corresponding string and bow instruments which were its ancestors, there is evidence.
On the painted roof of Peterborough Cathedral, in England, which is said to have been built in the year 1194 A.D., there is a picture of a woman seated, and holding in her lap a sort of viol, with four strings and four sound-holes. This seems to indicate that in very early days ladies sometimes played on stringed instruments, if only for their own amusement.
Among the accounts of King Henry VII., dated November 2, 1495, is the following item, "For a womane that singeth with a fiddle, 2 shillings."
Anne of Cleves after her divorce comforted herself by playing on a viol with six strings. Queen Elizabeth, also, amused herself not only with the lute, the virginals, and her voice, but also with the violin.
These, however, were amateurs, and the earliest professional violinist known was Mrs. Sarah Ottey, who was born about 1695, and who about 1721-22 performed frequently at concerts, giving solos on the harpsichord, violin, and bass viol. Previous to her there was one Signora Leonora Baroni, born at Mantua about 1610, but she played the theorbo and the viol di gamba.