Ernst Heinrich Roth made in 1923 (Copy of Nicolo Gagliano )

[KSelbach]

Hi,

I've got this wonderful instrument and I love it. 

It is supposed to be a Nicolo Gagliano copy but I don't find any Gagliano Violin in the Internet, which looks any similar.

The catalogue from 1924 does not say anything about Gagliano copys - only Guarneri and Stradivari. There is no written signature over the label, but the instrument is definitely made by Ernst Heinrich Roth I himself  and is a XI-R although it has no model number inside and is not on the records of the Roth company, which starts in 1924.

(H. Simson also created the catalogue some time after the violin was manufactured.)

Does anybody know which Gagliano violin  Roth possibly could have used as a model, at least from which year?

Of course I could ask in Bubenreuth, but I am afraid they ask for lots of money for giving a kind of certificate. 

Thanks for your comments.

Moritz

[Wood Butcher]

6 minutes ago, KSelbach said:

Hi,

I've got this wonderful instrument and I love it. 

It is supposed to be a Nicolo Gagliano copy but I don't find any Gagliano Violin in the Internet, which looks any similar.

That is because the violin you have pictured is a Guarneri model.

[Blank face]

14 minutes ago, Wood Butcher said:

That is because the violin you have pictured is a Guarneri model.

And to tell who exactly in the shop has made it one would need an eye-witness.

[KSelbach]

Might this be a similar case? Why put a label "copy of Gagliano" into a Guarneri model??

Just a mistake?

[Wood Butcher]

2 minutes ago, KSelbach said:

Might this be a similar case? Why put a label "copy of Gagliano" into a Guarneri model??

Just a mistake?

I can't answer that, I could only guess.

I would like to know how you are even playing it, when the strings are arranged in this monstrous fashion. Perhaps a special arrangement for a contemporary composition?


 

[Violadamore]

Found this violin on eBay (back match and pegbox wrap match, sharp photos that seem to include all those that the OP posted), shown as "out of stock".  Among the photos there is included what appears to be an email from Wilhelm Roth authenticating it as an X1R copy of a Nicolaus Gagliano Filius made in 1923.   Searching on the MN thread title will locate the item fast enough, so I'm not linking it here.   The seller in Berlin was asking 10K Euros. 

[KSelbach]

6 hours ago, Violadamore said:

Found this violin on eBay (back match and pegbox wrap match, sharp photos that seem to include all those that the OP posted), shown as "out of stock".  Among the photos there is included what appears to be an email from Wilhelm Roth authenticating it as an X1R copy of a Nicolaus Gagliano Filius made in 1923.   Searching on the MN thread title will locate the item fast enough, so I'm not linking it here.   The seller in Berlin was asking 10K Euros. 

That is the violin - I bought it for some Euro less. My luthier put new strings and a new bridge and soundpost on (the seller paid for it - good guy), and it has now the best sound of all my violins. I love Heinrich Roth instruments. (I have another one: 1989 IIR, which is also lovely.) 

Moritz

[match]

A nice instrument, glad you love it. But then, you’ve already had the confirmation from Bubenreuth… The new Guarneri model labels probably hadn’t arrived yet that day, but they wanted to close box – and as it happened, there was still one left for the Gagliano model…

[Michael Darnton]

Or it's just the usual eBay scam. One would hope that Wilhelm Roth knows a Guarneri model from a Gagliano model.

[KSelbach]

%

3 hours ago, match said:

A nice instrument, glad you love it. But then, you’ve already had the confirmation from Bubenreuth… The new Guarneri model labels probably hadn’t arrived yet that day, but they wanted to close box – and as it happened, there was still one left for the Gagliano model…

Well, the email confirmation from Bubenreuth was given to me from the seller - could be faked. But I like your explanation very much. I love imaginative people.

[GeorgeH]

1 hour ago, KSelbach said:

Well, the email confirmation from Bubenreuth was given to me from the seller - could be faked. But I like your explanation very much. I love imaginative people.

It looks like a nice Roth violin.

You can send your own pictures in for free to get an email reply that would confirm or not the email from the seller. The Roth firm will confirm what they will say on a certificate in the email.

You can also buy the certificate of authenticity, if you want. If you plan to sell it privately someday, those certificates of authenticity are worth the $200 or so. However, if your violin does not have a serial number inside to write on the certificate, they are less useful because those certificates do not have pictures to identify the particular violin.

[KSelbach]

I looked through the brochure of M. Simson 1924 and found on page 35 the picture of the IXR model 

"Josef Guarnerius Anno 1736", which is very similar to my violin.

I will ask in Bubenreuth whether it is the same model for my XI-R 1923, which was created practically only 1 year before the publication of the brochure in 1924.  If so, I would be interested whether somebody knows the exact model, maybe it has a name which is known.

Mr. Simson writes in the brochure that it is a completely intact "chef d'oevre" by Joseph Guarnerius del Gesu of the year 1736. The praise for this model in the booklet is more than enthusiastic.

I will ask Mr. Roth, whether there is a record about this. (And of course I will ask, if match is right about his funny assumption.)

Thanks for any idea!

Moritz

[martin swan]

To my eye the model of your violin is rather different, being narrower in the waist and in the upper bouts.

 

[match]

Who knows which lens the phone opted for, or which pair of glasses the lithographer happened to be wearing.

[match]

This model seems to be the same as the the op.
https://brobstviolinshop.com/instruments/ernst-heinrich-roth-markneukirchen-1923/?view=grid Funny that the antiquing job was done following the same pattern.

[KSelbach]

3 hours ago, martin swan said:

To my eye the model of your violin is rather different, being narrower in the waist and in the upper bouts.

 

Martin, I am impressed. You see, what I cannot see. So I had to check it out with Photoshop and you are right!

[KSelbach]

22 minutes ago, match said:

This model seems to be the same as the the op.
https://brobstviolinshop.com/instruments/ernst-heinrich-roth-markneukirchen-1923/?view=grid Funny that the antiquing job was done following the same pattern.

I had seen that in the shop and asked them already about the model to no avail.

[KSelbach]

Mr. Wilhelm Roth answered my E-mail.

About the "Copy: Nicolaus Gagliano Filius," label he says "The label is original, and we have several instruments in our 
digital photo archive. So it wasn't a single instrument, but others as well.
It isn't fake, but an original label from Ernst Heinrich Roth."

About the model used he writes: "It's possible that it was the same model as the IX-R back. 
However, the varnish picture is the same as the XI-R."

The XI-R has no picture in the 1924 catalogue, but the new XI-R instruments, sold today in fact really show a very similar back to my violin.

So I still don't know what was the original Guarneri of which year used by E.H.Roth I. 

Shall I give up now?

Moritz

[Blank face]

I would neither assume that the "copy of..." something labelling means that it is in fact a copy of a particular violin (there was once a similar discussion regarding the Lord Wilton labelled Roths) nor that they all followed straight forward the patterns shown in the catalogue of a particuar year. Similar applies to almost all Mirecourt catalogues and labels.

These hadn't much in common with the contemporary ideas about bench copies.

[GeorgeH]

The 17xx year numbers represent the model; they don’t indicate that the violin is bench copy of a particular Strad or GDG violin.

It is a very nice Roth violin.

[match]

On 5/5/2025 at 4:49 PM, KSelbach said:

I had seen that in the shop and asked them already about the model to no avail.

No need to ask. As written in their description it's the same model from the same year as yours.

[jacobsaunders]

19 minutes ago, match said:

 

That's Gagliano, is it? 

[match]

Naturally, if it made it onto the label, who are we to argue?

[KSelbach]

OK, I am at the point, where I started this.

It is a Gagliano model, disguised as a Guarneri.

Here is another one:

"This particular violin is a reproduction of the Alessandro Gagliano model, originally made in Naples in 1720. The violin's remarkable aesthetic features a high-contrast varnish with deep brown and purple-brown hues on the F-holes and C-bouts."

https://www.schmittmusic.com/products/consignment-roth-gagliano

Moritz

[Strad O Various Jr.]

14 minutes ago, KSelbach said:

OK, I am at the point, where I started this.

It is a Gagliano model, disguised as a Guarneri.

Here is another one:

"This particular violin is a reproduction of the Alessandro Gagliano model, originally made in Naples in 1720. The violin's remarkable aesthetic features a high-contrast varnish with deep brown and purple-brown hues on the F-holes and C-bouts."

https://www.schmittmusic.com/products/consignment-roth-gagliano

Moritz

that does not look like a Roth