Category:Mandora (ca.1420) from Milan?, Italy. MET 64.101.1409

Metropolitan Museum of Art, online collection (accession number 64.101.1409)

• [64.101.1409] Mandora. Milan?, Italy (ca.1420). Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, since 1964, Accession Number: 64.101.1409 , ObjectID: 503048.
  "​Date: ca. 1420 ",
  "​Geography: Milan?, Italy ",
  "​Culture: Italian ",
  "​Medium: Boxwood, rosewood, ebony ",
  "​Dimensions: 14 3/16 × 3 3/4 × 3 1/8 in. (36 × 9.6 × 8 cm) ",
  "​Classification: Chordophone-Lute ",
  "​Credit Line: Gift of Irwin Untermyer, 1964 ",
  "​Accession Number: 64.101.1409 ",
  "​Additional Dimensions: Weight: 255 grams (0.12 lbs); Diameter of rosette (including border): 3 1/4 in. (8.3 cm) ",
  "​Provenance: Irwin Untermyer , New York ; E. de Miller-Aichholz , Vienna ; Albert Figdor , Vienna ; Oscar Bondy , Vienna ",
  "​[Description:] This is the most elegant example of three similar, extant small stringed instruments that date from the early fifteenth century. Originally the instrument would have been strung with five strings, but whether it was played with a bow or plucked with a plectrum or fingers, remains unclear. The carved imagery relates to courtly romance and probably alludes to the rewards of fidelity in love. Cupid, armed with bow and arrow, hovers over the couple, a young man represented as falconer (the falcon denotes loyalty and trust) and a maiden with unbound hair who clasps his arm. A dog, likewise suggesting loyalty, sits at their feet. The rich iconography of the instrument unites art and music in the service of romance. "
  • Mandora. Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. Metrpolitan Museum of Art.

• Cloisters (Museum) "216 Gittern - North Italian, XIV Century, Various Media, Boxwood and bone, L. 13 in. (33cm.)" in Medieval Art from Private Collections: A Special Exhibition at the Cloisters, October 30, 1968, Through March 30, 1969 : Introduction and Catalogue, Metropolitan Museum of Art, p. 351–352
  "​Various Media / North Italian, XIV century / Boxwood and bone / L. 13 in. (33 cm.) ",
  "​This beautiful instrument has been called a gittern, but it is not exactly like any wellknown type of stringed instrument. As it was meant to be played with a bow, it can be called an early ancestor of the violin, related to the late medieval-Renaissance rebec, which had three strings. This, however, had five, as indicated by the marks on the nut and the holes as the lower end. Strings and pegs are missing. ... ",
  "​ EX COLL.: E. de Miller-Aichholz, Vienna; Albert Figdor, Vienna; Oscar Bondy, Vienna. ",
  "​ Bibliography: Sammlung Dr. Albert Figdor, Wien (sale catalogue), v, Berlin, 1930, pl. 97, no. 125; Otto von Falke, "Aus der Sammlung Figdor. 1. Kunstgewerbe," Pantheon, IV, 1929, p. 331, fig. 9; Karl Geiringer, Musical Instruments, New York, 1945, pl. 12, no. 1; Emanuel Winternitz, "British Musical Instruments. An Exhibition in London," Music Library Notes, Washington, IX (June 1952), p. 398; Yvonne Hackenbroch, The Irwin Untermyer Collection, v, New York, 1962, pp. xi, 6, pl. 5; Emanuel Winternitz, Musical Instruments of the Western World, New York, 1967, pp. 48, 51, ill. ",
  "​Lent by Irwin Untermyer "