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The Early History of the Viol

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 1976

Ian Woodfield
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Extract

The first important centre of viol making and viol playing in the late fifteenth century was the Mediterranean city of Valencia, capital of the southernmost province of the Kingdom of Aragon. From Valencia the viol quickly spread to nearby parts of the Aragonese kingdom such as the Maestrazgo region, the provinces of Aragon and Catalonia, and the islands of Majorca and Sardinia. Late fifteenth-century paintings of the Madonna and Child serenaded by music-making angels clearly reflect the growing popularity of the viol throughout this area of the western Mediterranean. One of the earliest depictions of the viol, probably dating from the 1470s, appears in the work of a Catalan artist active in a northern district of the province of Valencia known as the Maestrazgo. Photographs of this painting (plate 1) show it to have been in a very poor condition, but it has since been restored (perhaps even completely repainted) and can now be seen in the church of San Felíu just above the town of Játiva.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association , Volume 103 , 1976 , pp. 141 - 157
Copyright
Copyright © 1978 The Royal Musical Association and the Authors

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References

1 The gradual evolution of the mid-fifteenth-century vihuela into two distinct instruments, the plucked vihuela de mano and the bowed vihuela de arco (i.e. the viol) is discussed in I. Woodfield, The Origins of the Viol (diss., University of London, 1977).Google Scholar

2 Woodfield, op. cit., chapter 3.Google Scholar

3 Mallett, M., The Borgias (London, 1969), 89.Google Scholar

4 Mallett, op. cit., 207.Google Scholar

5 Mallett, op. cit., 129 and 196.Google Scholar

6 ‘Heri anche il prefato Duca de Barri gli condusse Madama & tuta la turba e poi se presono a fare sonare quelli sonadori spagnoli che mandò el Reverendissimo Monsignore Ascanio da Roma, qualj soano viole grande quasi come mj, & invero il sonare suo è più presto dolce che de multa arte … Vigelani vj martij 1493. E de vostra Illustrissima, servitor devotus, Bernardinus Prosperus.’ I am most grateful to Mr William Prizer for supplying this extract from his research into the Mantuan archives.Google Scholar

7 I Diarii di Marino Sanuto, vi (Venice, 1881), col.175.Google Scholar

8 The importance of Ferrara as a musical centre has been discussed by L. Lockwood, ‘Pietrobono and the Instrumental Tradition at Ferrara’, Rivista italiana di musicologia, x (1975), 115–33; and ‘Music at Ferrara in the Period of Ercole I d'Este’, Studi musicali, i (1972), 101–31.Google Scholar

9 Post, C. R., A History of Spanish Painting (Cambridge, Mass., 1935), vi: The Valencian School in the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance, introduction.Google Scholar

10 I Dιarιi di Marino Sanuto, iv (Venice, 1880), col. 230.Google Scholar

11 Mallett, op. cit., plate 7.Google Scholar

12 Bridgman, N., La vie musicale au quattrocento (Paris, 1964), 203.Google Scholar

13 Bridgman, op. cit., 216.Google Scholar

14 Prizer, W. F., ‘Performance practices in the frottola’, Early Music, iii (1975), 227–35. Mr Prizer has kindly sent me a list of references to the ‘viola’ that he has taken from the archives in Mantua. In the early sixteenth century the ‘viola spagnola’ or the ‘viola a la spagnola’ is mentioned a number of times.Google Scholar

15 Tyler, J., ‘The renaissance guitar 1500–1650’, Early Music, iii (1975), 342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Castiglione, B., Il libro del cortigiano (Venice, 1528).Google Scholar

17 Vasari, G., Le vite de'più eccelenti pittori scultori ed architettori, ed. G. C. Sansoni (Florence, 1879), iv, 494–8. Vasari also praised Timoteo Viti's own musical ability; he could apparently perform well on every kind of musical instrument, particularly the lira to which he sang improvisations with the most extraordinary grace.Google Scholar

18 Galilei, V., Dialogo della musica antica, et della moderna (1581) 147: ‘La Viola da Gamba, & de braccio, tengo per fermo che ne siano stati autori gli Italiani, & forse quelli del regno di Napoli’.Google Scholar