Guitar
Date1650 ca.
Place MadeItaly, Europe
DescriptionThis guitar is of an unknown maker, though likely in the Venetian tradtion. It has been converted to a six-string guitar in the nineteenth century and received a later back, but preserves its original, delicately constructed parchment rose.Materials: Rosewood sides, neck veneered in ebony set into ivory; ivory plaques; mother-of-pearl inlay; back of plain maple fingerboard with engraved ivory plaques; 2-tiered rose surrounded by mother-of-pearl inlay.
ProvenanceLaurence Witten acquired the guitar from a music store in New York City, 1970.
Purchased by the National Music Museum from Laurence Witten family, New Haven, Connecticut, 1984.
Published ReferencesAndré P. Larson, “Early Italian Plucked Stringed Instruments at the Shrine to Music Museum,” Lute Society of America Newsletter, Vol. XX, No. 1 (February 185), p. 8.
Credit LineWitten-Rawlins Collection, 1984
Object number03438
On View
Not on view
1680-1730 ca.
