The country which affords us the most ancient memorials of a perfect
language, of an advanced civilization, of a philosophy in which
all phases of human thought find expression, of a poetry rich
in every style, and of a musical art corresponding with the lively
susceptibilities of the people—India—appears to have given birth to bow
instruments.
Classical antiquity, in its forms of sculpture and bas–relief, contains
no suggestion of the instrument. A little figure of Apollo playing upon
a kind of violin with something like a bow, exhibited in Florence, has
been proved to be of modern production. This is the only known piece of
sculpture reputed ancient, in which anything like a bow can be found.
Ancient painting, while giving many delineations of musical instruments,
in every case fails to represent that indispensable adjunct of the
violin proper,—the bow.
As to India, no conjecture based on obscure interpretation of record or
delineation is needed, for the veritable instruments exist to–day,
preserving, in the main, their original characteristics. The first or
simplest form of bow instrument seems to have consisted of a little
hollow cylinder of wood covered at one end with a piece of skin tightly
stretched, and furnished with a neck and bridge, the whole being very
much like a modern banjo. A slip of bamboo, bent so as to hold tense a
bundle of hairs, furnished the bow. The number of strings was variable,
according to the purpose of the instrument. Thus, in the case of the
virtuoso, one string was deemed sufficient, while for the uses of the
common people two or three were permitted. The antiquity claimed by
Indian writers for this form of bow instrument is almost incredible; one
tradition relates that it was invented by one of the early kings of
Ceylon, at a period about five thousand years before the Christian era.
In that dawn of history the migratory tides flowing from the East to the
West, from India through Asia, Persia, Arabia, thence through northern
Europe, and thence across the Danube and the Rhine, have left other
memorials than the stormy history of their wars. The polite arts of
to–day find their crude germs in that ancient time. And although, by the
ready interchange of ideas achieved by modern civilization, a modern
invention may embody suggestions gathered from all countries and all
times, it is possible to examine each component part, to follow up each
relative train of thought which has here found practical expression,
until we arrive at the single idea, the main–spring, as it were, of the
whole mechanism. In music the violin may be traced back through a
thousand varied forms until it finds its beginning in the _revanastron_,
or, as I have called it, the banjo–fiddle of India. At the time of its
invention, it was undoubtedly designed for nothing higher than an
accompaniment to the voice. As such it exists to–day in parts of India
and Arabia, and in such menial capacity it was retained until about the
12th century. In fact, bow instruments did not come into special notice
in Europe until about the 13th or 14th century.
At that time the natural divisions of the human voice, long recognized,
were definitely classed into soprano, tenor, alto, and bass; and music
began to be considered in the true dignity of its position as an art to
be scientifically cultivated. With the scientific division of the voice,
bow instruments became at once similarly divided into their four
registers. The form of instruments was still arbitrary; the number of
strings and manner of tuning varied with every new caprice; but the
instrumental combinations of that day contained the nucleus of the
modern quartette.
Still, despite the progressive steps and more popular diffusion of
musical knowledge, the instruments of the violin family at that time,
and for a period of nearly two centuries, held but a precarious tenure
of existence in the rivalry with the more robust fellow–members of the
orchestra; for the musical susceptibilities of the people appear to have
been more cordially appealed to and drawn out by the sonorous blasts of
the brazen trumpet and the artillery of the kettle–drum, than by the
sweet and subdued tones of the bow instruments of the day.
It is related that King Henry the Eighth of England, in the year 1530,
was entertained at Cardinal Wolsey’s palace with “a concert of drums and
fifes.” This is nothing compared with the heroic endurance of his
daughter Elizabeth, who was “daily regaled during dinner with twelve
trumpets, two kettle–drums, which, together with fifes, cornets, and
side–drums, made the hall ring for half an hour together.”
Between the latter part of the 15th century and the first half of the
16th, the instruments of the viol family, with the introduction of the
_viol d’amour_ and the _viol di gamba_, reached the terminus of their
servitude as appendages to the voice, and at one step culminated in the
invention of the violin as we have it to–day. The new curvatures of the
top and back; the deep indentures of the sides for convenience of the
bow; the sweep of the outline; the scroll; the removal of the frets on
the finger–board,—an ancient distinguishing feature, perpetuated in the
arrangement of the neck of the guitar,—all these innovations upon
established conventionality seem to have been made at once. Since that
time the violin has steadily, and without retrogression, advanced to its
present position in popular estimation,—the aristocrat of musical
instruments. Laboring under difficulties not encountered by the voice,
it is yet capable of presenting a rhythmic musical picture, which the
mind can take up and at once translate to the feelings in intelligible
language.