Antonio Stradivari (1644 (?) – December 18, 1737) was an Italian manufacturer of stringed instruments such as violins, cellos, guitars, violas and harps. He is generally considered the most important craftsman in this field.
Stradivari is believed to have been responsible for the production of some 1,100 different instruments. Around 650 of these are believed to have survived and of these more than 500 are violins.
It’s the dream of every yard sales prowler and thrift store buyer to find that long-lost Stradivarius violin and reap the millions of dollars that would be the result of such a find. Unfortunately, many unsuspecting buyers make the mistake of finding one of the thousands upon thousands of reproductions that were produced and, thinking they found the real deal, pay too much for a knockoff.
Most of these reproductions were built in Czechoslovakia or Germany from the early 19th century to about 1920 and number in the tens of thousands. The vast majority of these are labeled “Antonius Stradivarius Cremonensis Faciebat Anno“with a date handwritten or printed underneath. These labels are glued to the inside of the violin and are clearly visible through the” f “.
These are “Stradivarius” style violins or reproductions. When they were produced, they were not actually intended to mislead the buyer. It was more of a marketing ploy to indicate that the violin was designed from the originals made by Antonio Stradivari.
Due to this fact, the date on the “f-hole” labels is usually correct as to the year the instrument was produced. A label dated 1865 should be a clue that it is a reproduction of Stradivari’s death in 1737.
When the original buyer was buying this violin, he knew he was getting an instrument that was a cheap copy of a priceless Stradivarius and not the real one. Over the years, the facts surrounding these knockoffs were forgotten, and thus a number of “found” Strads began to appear in antique stores, pawn shops, and yard sales.
Many of these have labels printed in English to comply with US import regulations at the time. If your Strad has an English label, it was not made by an 18th century Italian string instrument maker.
On most of his violins, Stradivari used a label printed with the last 2 numbers of the year that was done by hand in ink or pencil.
If you are looking at a labeled Stradivarius violin, you can be 99.99% sure that it is one of these fake instruments. Of the approximately 500 violins known to have been made by Antonio Stradivari, only one full hand is not counted. They are believed to be lost or stolen and never recovered.
Beginning in March 1891, after the enactment of the McKinley Tariff Act, all products imported into the US were required to be marked in English with the country of origin. In 1914, the Tariff Law was amended to make the words “Made in” in addition to the country of origin mandatory. This was not rigorously enforced until around 1921, so some pre-1921 pieces can still be found without “Made In” added. If your violin is labeled with a country of origin, it is most likely made after 1891 and is most likely a Stradivarius “Style” or fake violin.
As the US market was the largest at the time, most musical instrument manufacturers complied very quickly with the Tariff Act and produced thousands of these copies of Stradivarius labeled “Made In” during the last years of the 19th century. and early twentieth century. .
The quality of these reproductions varies greatly from fairly good to very poor. The current market values for these late 19th and early 20th century Strads vary widely. Its value depends on the quality of the construction, the condition and the sound. This is something that would have to be determined by a specialist who deals with stringed instruments.
With that said, I often see these German or Czechoslovak copies selling for less than $ 75.00 at auction. However, if you have one of these knockoffs, you may not miss all of them. Do some research on the bow, as I have seen $ 2,500.00 bows with $ 75.00 violins.
Today, a genuine Stradivarius can sell for a huge amount of money. One of his most famous pieces is a violin that he completed in 1721 and is known as “Lady Blunt.” It is named after Lord Byron’s granddaughter, Lady Anne Blunt, who had it for 30 years. The “Lady Blunt” was sold on July 21, 2011 for a sum of $ 15,932,115.00 at the Tarisio auction. It was sold by the Nippon Music Foundation in aid of the Japan earthquake and tsunami.
