help me know how old this vintage violin is please

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skyovercloker
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help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by skyovercloker » Thu Jul 23, 2020 3:44 pm

Hello friends, I found in a vintage bazaar this violin in complete poor condition, luckily it only required cleaning since its varnish is not so damaged. older person and commented it had been from his grandfather. it is not clear to me if it is from the year 1850 to 1900. (maybe it is not so old but the traces of moth and how you look if it makes it clear to be too old)
I looked for brand images and I only found this in the "fine tuners", "W. Germany" if someone can tell me what year it will be approximately.

heres is how i get it
Image

heres is after just clean
Image

and here is the fine tuner behind have this words, and i cant find any information about on web .
Image

thanks

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BoringPostcards
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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by BoringPostcards » Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:02 pm

No idea, but you might get more bites, if you post in the other instruments section.
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adamrobertt
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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by adamrobertt » Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:14 pm

Well, West Germany only existed as an official state between 1949 and 1990, so it has to be from that time period. That's still a range of 41 years, so you can def. narrow it down from there, but that's a starting point.

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marqueemoon
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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by marqueemoon » Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:35 pm

adamrobertt wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:14 pm
Well, West Germany only existed as an official state between 1949 and 1990, so it has to be from that time period. That's still a range of 41 years, so you can def. narrow it down from there, but that's a starting point.
Those fine tuners could have been added at any point though.

Are there any marks or badges inside?

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skyovercloker
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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by skyovercloker » Fri Jul 24, 2020 7:58 am

marqueemoon wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:35 pm
adamrobertt wrote:
Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:14 pm
Well, West Germany only existed as an official state between 1949 and 1990, so it has to be from that time period. That's still a range of 41 years, so you can def. narrow it down from there, but that's a starting point.
Those fine tuners could have been added at any point though.

Are there any marks or badges inside?
the detail is that the instrument belonged to a man who years ago played said violin in a remote church in the mountains of a rural town, in mexico (a very remote place) where he could not have found those tuners, so he makes it clear to me that the violin was never modified. I can't find any marks, only holes left by the moth.

----
They are two violins as soon as I can verify the other since I have hopes that if I carry a brand decal inside, I could be stuck inside with the remains of the moths.

Thank you for your answers

shortly I show you some photos with more definition for you to see

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marqueemoon
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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by marqueemoon » Fri Jul 24, 2020 9:00 am

To me it looks like a decent student model violin. The carving on the scroll looks pretty well done.

The fingerboard has some discoloration. Ebony is the usual fingerboard wood for a violin, and on most high end instruments it’s the dark stuff. On a cheaper violin it’s often dyed which can wear away over time.

If all it needs is a bridge it seems worth putting a little money into as something to play.

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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by MechaBulletBill » Fri Jul 24, 2020 10:03 am

it looks an awful lot like a violin we borrowed, which also had very similar "w. germany" tuners. we reckoned that one was from 50s-70s.

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Re: help me know how old this vintage violin is please

Post by chrisrnps » Thu Aug 19, 2021 10:53 am

The stamp on the metal fine tuner doesn’t provide any information on the age or provenance of the instrument itself, even less so than on an electric guitar.

If there’s no label to be found inside the violin and no other makers mark anywhere, you likely will not be able to find out more information (and an appraiser won’t be able to do much either).

Most such instruments are student instruments or “copies” and won’t be worth much even if they are from the 1800s or 1900s.

That doesn’t mean they can’t be good or even very good instruments. My oldest violin (passed down since my great grandmother) is a Jacobus Stainer copy from the mid to late 1800s but the label inside even fakes a Stainer mark and year - they even copied the labels a lot of the time! It’s probably “worth” well under $1000 but is “priceless” to me since it has family history, was my first “real” instrument once I was big enough to have a non-fractional-sized violin, and I’ve played it for almost 40 years now.
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