German Violin: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This violin was made in Mittenwald, Germany around 1800. It shows evidence of extensive repairs and retouching of the varnish. This violin has a reproduction Sebastian Klotz label and is made of a two-piece table of two-piece spruce, two-piece back of maple with even medium-fine descending figure, ribs of similar maple, grafted maple neck terminated in the original maple pegbox and scroll, and an opaque reddish-brown varnish.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date made: 1790-1810
• Object Name: violin
• Physical Description: spruce (table material)
• Physical Description: maple (back material)
• Measurements: overall: 23 1/2 in x 8 1/4 in x 3 3/4 in; 59.69 cm x 20.955 cm x 9.525 cm
• Place Made: Germany: Bavaria, Mittenwald
• ID Number: MI.76.12
• catalog number: 76.12
• accession number: 322697
• 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.