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RCM 203 Lute (formerly ?Chitarrone) Vendelio (Wendelin) Venere, Padua, 1600 Inscriptions Printed label: 1600 {-.} [?]{T.} / IN PADOVA Vvendelio Venere [date and initials handwritten (see Commentary)] Engraved ivory plaque on pegbox: FROM / THE COLLECTIONS / SUCCESSIVELY / OF / CARL ENGEL. / & / A.J.HIPKINS. Brief description Originally a Paduan chitarrone or lute, converted in the 18th century as a theorbo and in the 19th century as a lute Dimensions : 1089 : 532 : 365 : 164 : 684 Description Later two-piece front, book-matched, of fine to medium grain. Shadow of earlier bridge position c.88.5mm from tail; existing bridge 129.2mm from tail. Soundhole has inserted rose cut from another, possibly the original, front; pattern of interlocking circles with chip-carved border; six small strengthening bars across rose. Bridge of maple drilled for six pairs of strings and eight single bass strings. Eight full-width transverse bars, three of which cross the rose; one hooked bar on the bass side and three short fan bars on the treble side in the bridge area. Front has line of ebony edging. Back of 31 yew ribs with heartwood/sapwood stripe used decoratively to give the impression of twice as many ribs; ribs slightly hollowed. Joints strengthened with lengthways paper strips c.5.5mm wide cut from a printed medical treatise; also four transverse parchment or vellum strips, 5–9mm wide, with traces of MS and rubrics, and a broader piece of same below inner liner at tail, probably applied later to pull ribs together by contraction. In addition there are later more random transverse strips of plain parchment or vellum and small additional paper patches. Inner liner at tail coniferous, maximum depth 30.5mm, maximum thickness c.5mm. Top-block in two pieces; layer nearest neck coniferous, inner layer of ?willow; this layer goes over the paper strengthening strips. Nail goes through both layers into neck. Remains of edge linings on inside of front are of ?willow. Original capping-strip of plain outline. Later pegbox and core of neck ?maple. Neck veneered in ebony with bone edging. Pegbox of figured maple, open-backed, with hook-shaped finial. Transparent red stain on pegbox, of ?dragonsblood; twenty rosewood pegs with ivory inserts. Width of fingerboard: at nut 83.6mm, at joint 108.5mm. Diameter of rose insert 109mm, of rose opening 91.1mm; centre of rose from tail: 344mm. Commentary The original neck and pegbox arrangements cannot be deduced but the instrument was probably set up as a theorbo with new front and neck in the 18th century. Next 58
to the rebate for the (missing) full-width nut there is a filled recess for a shorter nut for the six stopped strings; the open bass strings would have gone to a second pegbox. The present open-backed and angled pegbox with twenty pegs is 19th-century work, perhaps from the period when the lute was owned and played by Carl Engel; the restorer may have thought that overspun basses made a second pegbox redundant. The bridge and most of the barring also appear to date from this period, but the old bar positions were retained. A Venere chitarrone dated 1611 survives in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. The label with its date of 1600 and initials is of interest: it indicates the workshop of Vendelio Venere II (Wendelin Eberle, 1576–1643), great nephew of Vendelio Venere I (Wendelin Tieffenbrucker, son of Leonardo Tieffenbrucker). Archival records show that Venere (‘Venus’) was a nickname used by several members of the family. Venere II’s father was Cristoforo Heberle (Eberle, c.1546–before 1621); both of them may have used the cutoff Venere label (excluding the second line, ‘de Leonardo Tiefembrucker’) that is in RCM 203 and other lutes dating from after 1591. Giorgio Venere (1590–1624) possibly a younger brother of Venere II, is also documented as a lute-maker in Padua (see Kiràly 1994, pp.26–32; Grove 2001, v.25, p.465). The initials on the label of RCM 203 are not clear but do not appear to be W. E. (for Wendelin Eberle) as on some lutes with the cutoff label, nor W.T. The top of the first initial, perhaps S, J or G, is hidden under the end of a parchment strip; the second initial might have been T, with a blurred full stop. Both have been re-written or altered in darker ink, probably by a restorer. See also Lute RCM 9. Provenance Gift of John and Edith Hipkins, 1911. This lute (like the Kirkman harpsichord, RCM 180) was owned and played by Carl Engel, who founded the instrument collection in the South Kensington Museum (later to become the Victoria and Albert Museum), and then by Alfred James Hipkins (1826–1903), first honorary curator at the RCM. References Cowling 1913, p.114 & pl.VI Grove 1927, v.3 p.254 Hipkins 1888, pl.XV, pp.29–30 Hipkins 1921, pl.XV, pp.31–3 Hipkins 1945, pl.XV, pp.31–3 Grove 1948, v.3 p.254 Grove 1954, v.5 p.438 Wells 1984, p.12
Lute, Vendelio Venere, RCM 203: detail of initials on label