As an update to the earlier thread on this topic. Primarily to Roger, et all who is interested ...
--- First of all, many many thanks to Carlos Gonzales (president of the Spanish Sociedad de la Vihuela) who made it possible to have a closer look at this astonishingly beautiful fresco. At the moment, I'm not sure that I'm allowed to publish the photographs that Carlos so kindly supplied me with, so here is a brief description of this one of the most remarkable and perhaps 'realistic' of surviving depictions of the late 15th century viola da mano. The depicted instrument is unmistakably a five-course viola da mano, a fact that is evidenced both by the number of strings (10) and corresponding number of pegs. The string band is virtually equal in width along the whole stretch from bridge to nut and the strings appear to be equally spaced on the both ends too. There are seven double-strand frets on the neck. The peg head is sickle-shaped and surmounted with a carved animal head; this last seems to appear as a separate part joined to the walls of the peg head and is of 'golden' colour, perhaps was gilded on the original(?). The right hand of the player (angel?) grips the neck in the area of the three upper frets in what appears almost like a closed grip, so that the thumb protrudes above the surface of the fingerboard shading the outer course (in other words indicating that the neck is fairly shallow). The soundboard is edged with double lines of red-brown and golden 'purfling' which continues a short distance along the edges of the neck and then ends rather abruptly, perhaps at the bottom end of the fingerboard. The lower area of the soundboard, including the bridge, is where the fresco appears to have been damaged, and it's difficult to see if the strings are tied to the bridge with a usual loop over the top surface of it (it almost looks like the two strings of the first course are ...). The rose does appear to have been painted on 'top' of the strings (although a number of individual strings 'below' are still visible) and its design can be, to a certain extent, re-established: it looks like an inset, three-tier(?) gilded rose, with a four-petal flower design in its centre. The sides of the instrument are painted blue (background), with greyish borders of lines and segment-like ornamental shapes stopping a short distance of pointed corner joints. (There is a similar sort of decoration consisting of large and small 'chain' of circles on the sides of the four-course guitar illustrated in Mercenne's Harmonie Universelle, 1636; which he, in turn, copied from the Phalese Guitar book of 1570. So perhaps there is a link here with the earlier ways of decorating instruments ...) It is interesting to speculate about the string length of this viola da mano. Unfortunately I still don't have the complete picture so as to get a more precise idea about it but judging by the size of the hand and relative positioning of the 7th fret, the string length may be around 50 - 52cm. For me personally, one of the most important features of this late 15th century representation of the viola da mano is the presence of even number of strings - 10. It means that the odd /even string number 'divide' was already present in the early days of the viola da mano's history and which seems to have been common for the forthcoming vihuela tradition too. Not to mention, of course, the rather tight gathering of strings in the string band, together with more or less perpendicular positioning of the palm of the right hand relative to it - strong indication for the 'thumb out' way of plucking. I know that Carlos has uncovered some more new sources of the vihuela iconography in Córdoba and perhaps some other places of Spain. It would be great to see his research, for the benefit of us all, published one day. But for the moment, great many thanks to him again! Alexander To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
