Guido

What's the convention for measuring string heights? See pic. A (straight down) or B (shortest distance) wouldn't make much difference on a violin, but on a cello C string the difference can be a couple of mm.

Not a Stainer but a decent violin worthy of some professional attention. Good bows, too.

I wouldn't say that. He was a student of Thomas Jacobsen in Copenhagen, whose workshop he eventually took over. He travelled, as you do, probably as a journeyman (!), and had unspecified time in Germany and with Vuillaume (or in his workshop). While good for the CV, it would be inappropriate to just declare him a student of Vuillaume. But that doesn't really matter at all for finding a home for you fiddle. If the repair label is relevant; and if there are no better ideas; I'd start by looking at some Copenhagen makers, progressively widening the circle. There is a slim chance that the violin didn't travel very far in it's early life before 1865, that's all.

At $15k it seems obvious to me that the seller KNOWS it is not a Bellafontana. At the same time $15k for an unattributed modern fiddle with a fake label seems a lot. At this price point you are spoilt for choice. You don't need to go bargain hunting, or take any risks.

I don't see neither Markneukirchen nor Mittenwald, no matter how many features one may call modified. My first rabbit hole to jump into would be to look into Danish makers active before 1865. That is, after a good hard look at the repair label.

Inventory numbers from the A.E. Smith shop look like this.

Might the violin have been in Sydney a hundred years ago?

A country of origin seems to be stamped into the lower facet at the butt end. The weight would be considered much too light by many and reduces severely the marketability/ price. The replaced face is done so badly that it is a liability rather than anything else. Would want to walk around with that face! Can’t tell from the photos if it is actually silver mounted or just polished nickel.

Your point is well made and accepted. Early 19th century, Knopf is a pretty isolated name, but we are talking late 19th century here. Was it 1872? We should have some active Bausch, Glass, Hoyer, Nuernberger, and others already.

I've just visited Raffin a few months ago with about 30 French bows. Got only 3 certificates with good maker names (none of those bows had the maker's name on them). There was a handful of JTL and Laberte and another handful of "School of..." where I didn't want to spend the money on a certificate. About half the bows were just unknown. So, should we just give up on identifying French bows altogether just because many of them will forever be anonymous? Seems a strange thought, but more common when it comes to German bows.

The statement seems pretty unambiguous to me. About 10-15 master/ workshops would be able to produce the quantity equal to all pernambuco and snakewood bows being produced on an ongoing basis. That doesn't allow any hard conclusions about who did what, but I guess it implies that the better/ relevant end of the market isn't all that large after all and may well be constituted by a reasonable number of attributable names. Another perspective on this is that traditionally nobody bothered and the fog was just too thick. More recently, and the development is ongoing, more effort is put into telling things apart. Some success is undeniable, and I'm optimistic more progress will come. And it doesn't have to be all or nothing. There will always be many bows that can't be attributed of course.

Yes, the head is a real treat. Too bad about the low quality work in the face replacement (but that won't be forever).

Iron for sure, typical brown rust. Also, magnetic.

Yes, of course, as we have heard dozens of times now. I just wonder why you keep representing it in such a distorted manner? It almost feels like we are not on the same page (page 22, that is). Gruenke also explains, that only about 4% of bow production was in pernambuco, including nickel mounted bows - so silver mounted bows in pernambucco is another fraction of the 4%. Gruenke goes on to explain that it would have taken about 10-15 masters (with their typical workshops) to produce all the bows made from pernambuco (and snakewood, to be generous). Doesn't sound too ridiculous to me to at least try and have a closer look. Anyone knows the stats for Mirecourt at the time? I wouldn't be surprised if you couldn't make that sound even worse for identification purposes of French bows.

Not just a post factual forum but a post factual world. And yes, sorry, there was a little bit of failed irony in the laser cut cambers and, well, a few other bits as well

Didn't say you said. But I said. You are probably right about this being a dealer stamp. The rest was what I said. Obviously you couldn't have said anything about the bow without having seen it, no?

You are probably right. Just a dealer stamp on a cheap export article. I attach a few more photos of the bow itself. It's silver mounted and looks like Knopf family to me. Maybe not worth rehairing. Those cambers at the head look like they were laser-cut. Maybe a sign of excessive production speed with these bows. If one just moves the knife fast enough... The wood is very beautiful, but of course pernambuco was abundant at the time and can be found at very cheap bows.

there won't be a better photo. it's just not there

I’ll take more pics later. But the area of the glare doesn’t really show anything at all, not even to the eye in the flesh, leave alone taking a good picture of what I don’t see. I was really just hoping someone had seen a similar brand or someone had an idea which bow maker family name ended in …SON. There wouldn’t be many. could be …& SON, but I thought the bow would be German.

What I can make out seems to read "J. .............SON". Anyone got any ideas how to fill the space? Bow has some age judging by the use of iron screws to fix the liner.

EBay would have listed dozens of modern and antique Italien violins for very little money at any given time. What could possibly go wrong?

"Trade violin" (or bow) most certainly carries a negative connotation with most people; and more often than not it is used in this understanding. How inadequate this can be illustrates my favourite example of a "trade bow". You may have heard of the French bow maker E. Sartory? Well, he made "trade bows", supplied unbranded to E. Gaertner in Germany, where they were branded as Gaertner before they were sold. Gaertner also sourced bows from H.R. Pfretzschner among others, but didn't make bows in his shop. So the Gaertner bows are "just trade bows".

Nice violin. The label is Heinrich Eichheimer. Someone here may know if he was a maker, a dealer, or just a made-up export label.

Was my first impression, too. But could be German imitating some French style features. Do we have cleats along the back centre seam?

Yes, our posts just crossed and I didn't see your description of warm/ bright for different materials. I suppose the end pin does carry the vibration. I'm aware of an amplification effect if you put the end pin on a box when playing. AS the pin carries the vibration different materials will dampen/ filter different frequencies to different degrees. Would be my guess,