A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Virginal

by Alfred James Hipkins

VIRGINAL or VIRGINALS (Fr. Clavecin rectangulaire). Virdung (Musica getuscht und auszgezogen; Basel, 1511) is the oldest authority we can cite who describes this keyboard instrument. His woodcut of it shows a rectangular or oblong spinet, which agrees in form with what we are told of the spinetta of 1503, said by Banchieri (Conclusione nel suono dell' organo; Bologna, 1608) to have been the invention of the Venetian Spinetti. Banchieri derives the name 'spinetta' from this maker; in later Italian the oblong spinet, which is the same as Virdung's virginal, is called 'spinetta tavola.' Virdung's virginal is, in fact, of the same shape as his clavichord, and has the same arrangement of keyboard (from the bass clef note F), but the soundboard of the clavichord is narrow; the jack-action of the virginal is derived from the psaltery plectrum, while the tangent of the clavichord comes from the monochord bridge. Virdung confesses he knows nothing of the invention of either, by whom or where. If the 'proverb' quoted by Rimbault, as formerly inscribed on a wall of the Manor House of Leckingfield, Yorkshire, be as old as the time of Henry the Seventh (1485–1509), it contains a reference earlier than Virdung. Rimbault's 'History of the Pianoforte' is a store-house of citations, and we borrow from them with due acknowledgment of the source and their great value. This proverb reads,

A slac strynge in a Virginall soundithe not aright,
It doth abide no wrestinge it is so loose and light;
The sound-borde crasede, forsith the instrumente,
Throw misgovernance, to make notes which was not his intente.

The house is destroyed, but the inscriptions are preserved in a MS. at the British Museum. According to Prætorius, who wrote early in the 17th century, Virginal was then the name of the quadrangular spinet in England and in the Netherlands. In John Minshen's 'Ductor in Linguas,' 1617, against 'Virginalls' we read, 'Instrumentum Musicum proprie Virginum … so called because virgins and maidens play on them. Latin, Clavicymbalum, Cymbaleum Virginæum.' Other lexicographers follow. Most to the purpose is Blount, Glossographia,' 1656: 'Virginal (virginalis), maidenly, virginlike, hence the name of that musical instrument called Virginals, because maids and virgins do most commonly play on them.' But another reason may be given for the name; that keyed stringed instruments were used to accompany the hymn 'Angelus ad Virginem,' as similar instruments without keys, the psaltery, for instance, had been before them. (See Chaucer's 'Miller's Tale.') From Henry the Seventh's time to nearly the close of the 17th century, 'Virginal' in England included all quilled keyboard instruments, the harpsichord and trapeze-shaped spinet, as well as the rectangular virginal of Virdung and Prætorius. For instance, in the 'Privy Purse Expenses of Henry the Eighth (Sir N. H. Nicholas editor; London, 1827) there is an entry: '1530 (April) Item the vj daye paied to William Lewes for ii payer of Virginalls in one coffer with iiii stoppes, brought to Grenwiche iii li … and for a little payer of Virginalls brought to the More, &c.' This two pair of Virginals in one case with four stops looks very like a double harpsichord. Again, in the inventory of the same king's musical instruments, compiled by Philip Van Wilder, a Dutch lute-player in the royal service,—the manuscript is in the British Museum—'a payre of new long virginalls made harp fashion of Cipres, with keys of Ivory, etc.' Still later, in 1638, from 'Original unpublished papers illustrative of the life of Sir Peter Rubens' (London, 1859), we find a correspondence between Sir F. Windebanck, private secretary to Charles the First, and the painter Gerbier, relating to a Ruckers 'virginal' the latter had undertaken to procure: 'Cest une double queue ainsi nommée [i.e. 'virginal'] ayant quatre registres et le clavier placd au bout.' There can be no doubt about either of these; although called virginals, they were at the same time double harpsichords. Huyghens (Correspondance, Jonkbloet et Land; Leyden, 1882) shows how invariably the clavicimbal or espinette was 'virginal' in England. Henry the Eighth played well, according to contemporary authority, on the virginal, and he had a virginal player attached to the Court, one John Heywood, who died at Mechlin about 1565.^[1] The same Heywood was one of Edward the Sixth's three virginal players. Mary, Elizabeth and James the First retained as many. Queen Mary is said to have equalled, if not surpassed, Queen Elizabeth in music, playing the regals and lute, as well as the virginals. One Cowts used to repair her virginals (Privy Purse expenses of the Princess Mary, Sir F. Madden, ed.; London, 1831). Queen Elizabeth's Virginal Book was in MS., and the first engraved music for this tribe of instruments, including harpsichords, was the 'Parthenia, the first musicke that ever was printed for the Virginals'; London, 1611. After the restoration of the Stuarts, we find in different publications for the harpsichord and virginal, the instruments clearly separated.

John Playford, in 'Musick's Handmaid,' distinguishes them, and in 1672, 'Introduction to the skill of Musick,' names Mr. Stephen Keen as a maker of 'Harpsycons and Virginals.' John Loosemore, Adam Leversidge, and Thomas White appear to have been at that time foremost English makers; they adopted the Italian coffer-shaped instrument, combining with it Flemish fashions in painting. Pepys, describing (Sept. 2, 1666) the flight of the citizens at the time of the Great Fire, says, 'I observed that hardly one lighter or boat in three that had the goods of a house in, but there was a paire of virginals in it.' The plural, or rather dual, in organs, regals, virginals, with the following 'pair,' signifies a graduation or sequence, as now-a-days a pair of stairs.' In spite of the interesting statement of Pepys the destruction of virginals by this terrible catastrophe must have been very great, for very few musical instruments are found in this country anterior in date to the Great Fire. In Queen Anne's reign we hear no more of the virginal; the 'spinnet' is the favourite domestic instrument.

'Queen Elizabeth's Virginal,' which bears her royal arms and is the property of the Gresley family, a familiar object in the Tudor room of the Historic Loan Collection of the Inventions Exhibition, 1885, is really a pentagonal spinet, evidently of Italian make. With reference to Stephen Keene, a beautiful spinet of his make (spinetta traversa), belonging to Sir George Grove, has been examined with respect to the soundboard barring; we reproduce the diagram showing the barring, exhibited with the instrument in the same collection. Mersenne (Harmonie Universelle, 1636) mentions the skill of the contemporary French spinet- makers in thus preparing their soundboards. But that the Italians were their models is conclusively shown by the Antoni Patavini Spinet of 1550, belonging to Brussels, which we have now been able to examine, and the date of which there is no reason to dispute.

Notwithstanding the statement of Prætorius, we have not found the name Virginal common in the Netherlands. The 'Clavecin Rectangulaire' is 'Vierkante Clavisimbal.' The Ruckers, as well as other Antwerp makers, made these oblong instruments and so called them.^[2] Although not bearing upon Virginals, except in the general Old English sense, we take this opportunity to describe the Ruckers instruments that have come to light since the last addition (vol. iii, 652) in the catalogue of them given, pp. 197–9 in the same volume.

Hans Ruckers de Oude (the Elder).

(Continuation of Tables in vol. iii. pp. 197, 652.)

No.	Form.	Date.	Dimensions.					General Description.	Present Owner.	Source of information.
			ft.	in.		ft.	in.
63	Bent side.	1612	7	6	by	2	11	2 keyboards (put in by Messrs. Broadwood, 1885). Rose No. 1. Case and compass as No. 47. Inscribed Joannes Rvckers me fecit Antverpiae, 1612. Found at Windsor Castle, 1883. This may have been the large Harpsichord left by Handel to Smith, and given by the latter to King George III.	H. M. The Queen.	A. J. Hipkins.
64	Trapeze.	1591	5	7	by	1	11	. . . . . . . . . . . .	T. J. Canneel, Director of the Académie Royale Ghent.	T. J. Canneel.
65	Bent side.	1612	7	6	by	3	0	2 keyboards; black naturals. Rose No. 1. No name of original maker, but inscribed 'Mis en ravalement par Pascal Taskin, 1774,' meaning that the compass of keys was extended. This beautiful instrument, painted inside and out with Louis XIV. subjects by Vander Meulen, is said to have belonged to Marie Antoinette. It will be remembered as having adorned the Louis Seize Room of the Historic Collection, Inventions Exhibition, London. 1885.	Lord Powerscourt.	A. J. Hipkins.

Andries Ruckers de Oude (the Elder).

66

Bent side.

1636

7

8

by

3

1

2 keyboards. Rose No. 6. Buff stop. 'Mis en ravalement par Pascal Taskin, 1782.' Case and top Lacquer with Japanese figures. Exhibited, London. 1885.

Museo Civico, Turin.

A. J. Hipkins.

Lastly, to complete the short-octave theories put forth in Spinet, which we are enabled to do by nearer examination of instruments contributed to the present Historic Loan Collection (1885), the natural keys of the Patavini Spinet mentioned above are marked with their names. The lowest E key is clearly inscribed Do–C; on the next, the F, is written F. This writing is not so early as 1550, because Do was not then used for Ut. The probable date is about one hundred years later, when the solmisation was finally giving way before the simple alphabetic notation. There are other instances. Then as to the cut sharps:^[3] the small Maidstone clavichord, said to have been Handel's, has the two nearer or front divisions intended for fourths below the next higher naturals, the two further or back divisions being the usual semitones. The first explanation, as offered in vol. iii, p. 654b, may be therefore assumed to be true, and this, as well as the preceding hypothesis, established as facts.

[ A. J. H. ]

1. Mr. W. H. J. Weale owns a medal struck for Michael Mercator of Venloo in 1539. Mercator was maker of Virginals to Floris d'Egmont, Cardinal Wolsey, and Henry VIII. He was born 1491, died 1544.
2. See 'De Liggeren der Antwerpsche Sint Lucasgude,' by Rombouts and Van Lerius. Antwerp and the Hague, 1872
3. The oldest spinet with cut sharps in the Historic Loan Collection is, according to the Facies, by Edward Blount; but on the first key, and less legibly on the Jacks, is written 'Thomas Hitchcock his make in 1664.' A similar autographic inscription of this maker, but dated 1703 has been brought forward by Mr. Taphouse of Oxford. We are thus enabled to find Thomas Hitchcock's working time. We think John Hitchcock came after him.