instrument can be traced with some degree of certainty, but it is
quite impossible to decide at what date or in what place the use
of the bow was introduced. The bow developed very slowly in
Europe and remained a crude instrument as long as it was applied
to the rebab and its hybrids. Its progress became marked only
from the time when it was applied to the almost perfect guitar (q.v.), which then became the guitar fiddle (q.v.), the immediate
forerunner of the viols.
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| Drawn from the ivory cover of the Lothair Psalter, by permission of Sir Thomas Brooke. |
| Fig. 1.—Earliest Bow of the Crémaillère Type (c. 11th century). |
The first improvement on the primitive arched bow was to provide some sort of handle in a straight line with the hair or string of the bow, such as is shown in the MS. translation of the Psalms by Labeo Notker, late 10th century, in the University library, Leipzig.[1] The length of the handle was often greatly exaggerated, perhaps by the fancy of the artist. Another handle (see Bodleian Library MS., N.E.D. 2, 12th century) was in the form of a hilt with a knob, possibly a screw-nut, in which the arched stick and the hair were both fixed. The first development of importance influencing the technique of stringed instruments was the attempt to find some device for controlling the tension of the hair. The contrivance known as crémaillère, which was the first step in this direction, seems to have been foreshadowed in the bows drawn in a quaint MS. of the 14th century in the British Museum (Sloane 3983, fol. 43 and 13) on astronomy. Forming an obtuse angle with the handle of the bow is a contrivance shaped like a spear-head which presumably served some useful purpose; if it had notches (which would be too small to show in the drawing), and the hair of the bow was finished with a loop, then we have here an early example of a device for controlling the tension. Another bow in the same MS. has two round knobs on the stick which may be assumed to have served the same purpose.
A very early example of the crémaillère bow (fig. 1) occurs on a carved ivory plate ornamenting the binding of the fine Carolingian MS. Psalter of Lothair (A.D. 825), for some time known as the Ellis and White Psalter, but now in the library of Sir Thomas Brooke at Armitage Bridge House. The carved figure of King David, assigned from its characteristic pose and the treatment of the drapery to the 11th century, holds a stringed instrument, a rotta of peculiar shape, which occurs twice in other Carolingian MSS.[2] of the 9th century, but copied here without understanding, as though it were a lyre with many strings. The artist has added a bow with crémaillère attachment, which is startling if the carving be accurately placed in the 11th century. The earliest representation of a crémaillère bow, with this exception, dates from the 15th century, according to Viollet-le-Duc, who merely states that it was copied from a painting.[3] Fétis (op. cit. p. 117) figures a crémaillère bow which he styles “Bassani, 1680.” Sebastian Virdung draws a bow for a tromba marina, with the hair and stick bound together with waxed cord. The hair appears to be kept more or less tense by means of a wedge of wood or other material forced in between stick and hair, the latter bulging slightly at this point like the string of an archery bow when the arrow is in position; this contrivance may be due to the fancy of the artist.
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| Drawn from bows the property of William E. Hill & Sons. |
Fig. 2.—A, B, Tartini Bows; C, Tourte Bow. |
The invention of a movable nut propelled by a screw is ascribed to the elder Tourte (fig. 2); had we not this information on the best authority (Vuillaume and Fétis), it might be imagined that some of the bows figured by Mersenne,[4] e.g. the bass viol bow KL (p. 184), and another KLM (p. 192), had a movable nut and screw; the nut is clearly drawn astride the stick as in the modern bow. Mersenne explains (p. 178) the construction of the bow, which consists of three parts: the bois, bâton or brin, the soye, and the demi-roüe or hausse. The term “half-wheel” clearly indicates that the base of the nut was cut round so as to fit round the stick. In the absence of any allusion to such ingenious mechanism as that of screw and nut, we must infer that the drawing is misleading and that the very decided button was only meant for an ornamental finish to the stick. We are informed further that la soye was in reality hairs from the horse or some other animal, of which from 80 to 100 were used for each bow. The up-stroke of the bow was used on the weak beats, 2, 4, 6, 8, and the down-stroke on the strong beats, 1, 3, 5, 7 (p. 185). The same practice prevailed in England in 1667, when Christopher Simpson wrote the Division Viol. He gives information concerning the construction of the bow in these words: “the viol-bow for division should be stiff but not heavy. The length (betwixt the two places where the hairs are fastened at each end) about seven-and-twenty inches. The nut should be short, the height of it about a finger’s breadth or a little more” (p. 2).
As soon as Corelli (1653–1713) formulated the principles of the technique of the violin, marked modifications in the construction of the bow became noticeable. Tartini, who began during the second decade of the 18th century to gauge the capabilities of the bow, introduced further improvements, such as a lighter wood for the stick, a straight contour, and a shorter head, in order to give better equilibrium. The Tourtes, father and son, accomplished the rest.
After François Tourte, the following makers are the most esteemed: J. B. Vuillaume, who was directly inspired by Tourte and rendered an inestimable service to violinists by working out on a scientific basis the empirical taper of the Tourte stick, which was found in all his bows to conform to strict ratio;[5] Dominique Peccate, apprenticed to J. B. Vuillaume; Henry, 1812–1870, who signs his name and “Paris” on the stick near the nut; Jacques Lefleur, 1760–1832; François Lupot, 1774–1837, the first to line the angular cutting of the nut, where it slides along the stick, with a plate of
- ↑ MS. 774, fol. 30. For an illustration of it see Hyacinth Abele, Die Violine, ihre Geschichte und ihr Bau (Neuburg-a-D., 1874), pl. 5, No. 7.
- ↑ See Crowd for fig. from the Bible of Charles le Chauve; and also King David in the Bible of St Paul extra muros, Rome (photographic facsimile by J. O. Westwood, Oxford, 1876).
- ↑ See Dictionnaire raisonné du mobilier français (Paris, 1871), vol. ii. part iv. pp. 265 D, and 266 note.
- ↑ Marin Mersenne, L’Harmonie universelle (Paris, 1636–1637), pp. 184 and 192.
- ↑ Vuillaume’s diagram and explanation are reproduced by Fétis, op. cit. pp. 125-128.
