HISTORIC VIOLIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 130, 3 June 1937, Page 17

HISTORIC VIOLIN

"CLOVER-LEAF" AMATI

A.violin with a remarkable historyis the constant companion of Mr. George Pistorius, .of St. Louis, Missouri, who has just finished a tour of New Zealand under" engagement to the broadcasting authorities. '. According to its owner,: the instrument is what is known asa "clbver-ieaf" Amati, but its treatment in the course of a rather hectic career has deprived it of much of its intrinsic value, though it is still a very good fiddle.

Mr. Pistorius informed a repprter that this particular type of violin was the product of Andreas Amati, forerunner of the Cremona school and grandfather of the teacher of Stradivarius. The most perfect of a number made for Charles IX of. France, it was selected for the King's own use, and Andreas inlaid the clover-leaf design as a gesture that Charles's reign might be tempered with kindness. It had little effect. The massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day occurred before Charles's reign ended with his death in 1574. Later these violins were deposited in a vault: in Versailles, and during the revolution they disappeared in the monasteries. The "clover-leaf" was rescued years afterwards, says Mr. Pistorius, by Luigi Tarisio, described as the greatest violin connoisseur the world has ever known. Journeying through Europe repairing/ violins, he carried a common fiddle or two, and managed to exchange one for the "clover-leaf." He never parted from it, and on his death it went to Nicholas II of Russia,.who was said to have paid a fabulous sum for it. This is where the instrument was mutilated. A servant of the Tsar and a violin maker conspired to exchange an imitation for the original "clover leaf.". In - the hope that they might smuggle their prize out of Russia, they changed the Charles IX head for a common one and'scraped the original varnish off the violin. Thus they removed its value. Mr. Pistorius states that he bought the instrument-from a Russian nobleman who fled from his country to America with it. ' ■ .