Nail Violin
The German violinist Johann Wilde invented the nail violin around 1740. The instrument consists of a wooden soundbox (circular or semicircular) and metal nails. Sound is produced by drawing a violin bow across the nails, creating bell-like tones. While it has limited capabilities, the instrument was popular in the eighteenth century and other makers built similar instruments in various forms.
Technical description: Flat circular wooden soundbox, the top surface of which is a thin spruce soundboard pierced by three carved rosettes; around the edge of the soundboard are driven two overlapping rows of steel pins, one row of 44 pins (the larger ones staggered chromatically) giving a chromatic compass of three octaves starting on a C, and a 4th diatonic octave above, the other row of 23 pins make a diatonic scale starting on an F; accidental pins are bent slightly outward near their tops, naturals are straight; four short wire-topped bridges on the soundboard form two opposing Vs, with two smaller bridges off the soundboard below the open point of the Vs; pairs of sympathetic wire strings crossed these bridges from a double row of 32 tuning pins on one side of the circle to 13 hooked hitchpins on the opposite side, the strings passing between the vertical pins; in the solid bottom of the circle, a central hole extending into a knob-like protrusion within the soundbox. Played with a bow (missing). (Linda Moot, 1978)
Technical description: Flat circular wooden soundbox, the top surface of which is a thin spruce soundboard pierced by three carved rosettes; around the edge of the soundboard are driven two overlapping rows of steel pins, one row of 44 pins (the larger ones staggered chromatically) giving a chromatic compass of three octaves starting on a C, and a 4th diatonic octave above, the other row of 23 pins make a diatonic scale starting on an F; accidental pins are bent slightly outward near their tops, naturals are straight; four short wire-topped bridges on the soundboard form two opposing Vs, with two smaller bridges off the soundboard below the open point of the Vs; pairs of sympathetic wire strings crossed these bridges from a double row of 32 tuning pins on one side of the circle to 13 hooked hitchpins on the opposite side, the strings passing between the vertical pins; in the solid bottom of the circle, a central hole extending into a knob-like protrusion within the soundbox. Played with a bow (missing). (Linda Moot, 1978)
Artwork Details
- Title: Nail Violin
- Date: after ca. 1780
- Geography: Germany, France, or Bohemia
- Culture: European
- Medium: Wood, metal
- Dimensions: Diamter 30.2 cm.
Total H. 17.3 cm
Height of body 5.1 cm - Classification: Idiophone-Friction
- Credit Line: The Crosby Brown Collection of Musical Instruments, 1889
- Object Number: 89.4.953
- Curatorial Department: Musical Instruments
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Joachim Tielke
ca. 1685
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