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VIOL

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Originally appearing in Volume V28, Page 101 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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VIOL , a generic See also:

term for the bowed precursors of the See also:violin (q.v.), but in See also:England more specially applied to those immediate predecessors of the violin which are distinguished in See also:Italy and See also:Germany as the Gamba See also:family. The See also:chief characteristics of the viols were a See also:flat back, sloping shoulders, "c"-shaped See also:sound-holes, and a See also:short See also:finger-See also:board with frets. All these features were changed or modified in the violin, the back becoming delicately arched, the shoulders reverting to the rounded outline of the See also:guitar or See also:troubadour See also:fiddle, the shape of the sound-holes changing from " c " to " f," and the finger-board being carried considerably nearer the See also:bridge. The viols, of which the origin may be traced to the 13th and 14th See also:century See also:German Minnesinger fiddle, characterized also by sloping shoulders, can hardly be said to have evolved into the violin. The latter was derived from the guitar-fiddle through the See also:Italian See also:lyre or viol-See also:lyra family, distinguished as da braccio and da gamba, and having See also:early in the 17th century the outline and " f " sound-holes of the violin. The viol family consisted of See also:treble, See also:alto, See also:tenor and See also:bass See also:instruments, being further differentiated as da braccio or da gamba according to the position in which they were held against the See also:arm or between the knees. The favourite viol da gamba, or See also:division viol, frequently had a See also:man or a woman's See also:head instead of the See also:scroll finish to the peg-See also:box, and sometimes a few See also:fine See also:wire sympathetic strings tuned an See also:octave higher than the strings in the bridge. See also:Michael See also:Praetorius mentions no less than five sizes of the viol da gamba, the largest corresponding to the See also:double bass, and in a table he notes the various accordances in use for each. He carefully distinguishes these instruments as violen and the viole da braccio (our violin family) as geigen. Of the latter he gives six sizes, the highest being the pochette with vaulted back, a See also:rebec in fact, and the lowest corresponding to the See also:violoncello, which he calls bass viol or See also:geige da braccio. The viols were very popular in England in the 16th and 17th centuries, holding their own for a See also:long See also:time after the introduction of the louder-toned violin; they are fully described and figured in the musical See also:works of the See also:period, and more especially in See also:Christopher See also:Simpson's Division Viol (1667), See also:Thomas See also:Mace's Musick's See also:Monument (1676) and Jolla Playford's Introduction to the Skill of See also:Music. (K.

End of Article: VIOL

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