Nicolò Amati Violin: the "Florian Zajic"

Object Details

Amati, Nicolo

Description (Brief)

This violin was made by Nicolò Amati in Cremona, Italy, 1672. It is the Florian Zajic violin has a top of spruce with grain of medium width, two-piece back of quarter sawn maple with flame of medium width descending slightly from the center joint, ribs and scroll of slightly plainer maple, and varnish of a golden-brown color over a golden ground. There is an original printed label inside the instrument:

Nicolaus Amatus Cremonen. Hieronymi
Fil. ac Antonij Nepos Fecit. 1672

[“72” is handwritten

This violin is named after Professor Florian Zajic (1853-1926) of Berlin who studied at the Prague Conservatory, became the leader of

theater orchestras in Mannheim, Strassburg and Hamburg, and by 1891 was teaching at the Stern Conservatory in Berlin. His performance career included a recital with Ignacy Jan Paderewski in October, 1887 and a regular series of violin sonatas with Heinrich Grunfeld.

In 1885 he had acquired the Ferdinand David Guarneri del Gesu violin from his friend Herr Wilhelmj, which later became the property of Jascha Heifetz.

This Amati violin was acquired by the violin dealer Emil Herrmann who assembled a quartet of Amati instruments (the 1656 King Louis XIV and the 1672 Florian Zajic violins, the 1663 Professor Wirth viola, and the 1677 Herbert violoncello) for Mrs. Anna E. Clark. She lent them to the Loewenguth Quartet of Brussels before bequeathing the quartet to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington DC. The Corcoran loaned the quartet to the Claremont String Quartet of the North Carolina School of the Arts, and in 1975, to the Tokyo String Quartet, and then to the Takács Quartet before selling them to Dr. Herbert Axelrod in 1998. The Florian Zajic had also been played by the violinist, Rodney Friend, in 1986.

Credit Line

Gift of Evelyn and Herbert R. Axelrod

1672

ID Number

2000.0100.02

accession number

2000.0100

catalog number

2000.0100.02

Object Name

violin

Physical Description

spruce (overall material)

maple (overall material)

Measurements

overall: 23 1/2 in x 8 1/16 in x 3 7/8 in; 59.69 cm x 20.47875 cm x 9.8425 cm

Place Made

Italy: Lombardy, Cremona

See more items in

Culture and the Arts: Musical Instruments

Music & Musical Instruments

Exhibition

North Music Lobby

Exhibition Location

National Museum of American History

National Museum of American History

Record ID

nmah_1004508

Metadata Usage (text)

CC0

GUID (Link to Original Record)

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746a8-841f-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa