Vedei and Geige—Fiddle and Viol: German String Traditions in the Fifteenth Century

The traditions of string music and of players of stringed instruments before 1500 have remained vague to modern historians. From the early sixteenth century onward our notions concerning the violin and the viol are reasonably clear, and are founded on a substantial base of musical, iconographical, and archival sources. Our knowledge of the preceding period is less secure, primarily because documentation, especially musical, is much less complete. In a recent effort to address this situation, Ian Woodfield, working principally from iconographical material, proposed a stimulating thesis of primary Spanish influence in the early history of the viol in the decades immediately before and after 1500. ¹ The following explores yet another element in the history of the viol: the tradition of string playing in German courts and cities from about 1400 to 1520.