German Consort Bass Viol: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This bass viol was made by an unknown maker in Southern Germany, about 1730. It is a Concert Bass Viol, made of a two-piece table of even, fine-grained spruce, two-piece back of maple cut on the slab with faint, fine horizontal figure, ribs of similar maple, grafted maple neck and 18th-century maple pegbox and scroll with even medium figure, and opaque dark-brown varnish. There is a handwritten label inside the instrument:

In size, the body of this viol is that of a large consort bass. The overall workmanship of the instrument is rather rough and without ornament or inlaid purfling. The body is heavily ravaged by woodworm and is in a poor state of preservation. The body has been completely re-varnished and the table, originally from a large German viol of the period, has been cut and reduced at the edges to fit the back and ribs. The instrument bears an interesting 18th-century southern German ornamental six-string pegbox and closed scroll with two volutes.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: 1725-1735
• Object Name: viol
• Physical Description: spruce (overall material)
• Physical Description: maple (overall material)
• Measurements: overall: 8 1/2 in x 16 3/8 in x 48 1/4 in; 21.59 cm x 41.5925 cm x 122.555 cm
• place made: Germany
• ID Number: MI.60.1417
• accession number: 229483
• catalog number: 60.1417
• Credit Line: Yale University
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.