Images(4)

2009 Conservation photography. Spinet, keyboard detail.

Spinet

Date1764 (dated)

Artist/Maker William Harris (fl1765-1793)

OriginEngland, London

MediumWalnut: case, lid; Beech: bridge, nut, pin block, stand, box guide; Plain light hardwood: inscription inlay; Spruce: soundboard; Oak: case substrate, key-frame balance rail; Softwoods: key levers, bottom, key-frame side rails and back rail, rack stop rail, jack-rail substrate; Fruitwood: jacks; Iron: balance pins, rack pins; Brass: lid hinges, lock plate, jack-rail hook; Ivory: natural tops

DimensionsNet dimensions exclude lid, stand and projecting moldings. All dimensions in mm except where noted. Length: 2,015 mm (net 1,984 mm); Width: 681/782 mm (net 673/780 mm); Height: 810 mm (net 199 mm)

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number2001-825,A

DescriptionCASE DECORATION: The case is veneered with walnut panels, holly line stringing, and walnut crossbanding. The spine is also veneered (a later addition). The jack rail is decorated with cross-grained walnut veneer and a single line of holly stringing. A molding surrounds the bottom of the instrument. One lid hook, now missing, had been centered on the veneer panel on the bent end of the bent side. The inner rim has vertical-grained walnut with one line of stringing. The top edge of the case sides are cross-grain veneered.
KEYWELL: The nameboard and keycheeks are veneered with panels of vertical-grained stump walnut and crossbanding of rosewood (unlike the rest of the case which has walnut crossbanding). The namebatten has vertical-grained walnut veneer and a boxwood inscription inlay, the ends of which have the same traditional design used by Kirckman and other English makers. A central screw is a 2009 reproduction.
LID: The lid is solid walnut with applied drop molding around the sides. A slant flap covers the keys. Three brass strap hinges are of a standard design for English spinets of the period. The lock plate and hasp are engraved, though no other brasses are engraved.
STAND AND PEDALS: The present stand is old but apparently not original to the spinet. It is a trestle stand with legs that are cabriole with pad feet below the trestle and turned above the trestle. The bedbolt hole had been filled but the fill was removed in 2009. The bottom of the spinet has dozens of puncture holes typically left by a stand fitted with metal pins for gripping the instrument. The present stand does not seem to have ever had such pins.
Note that the 1766 William Harris spinet in St. Louis has an identical stand. This type of stand, seen most commonly in English harpsichords and spinets in the period, is an unusual combination of Jacobian and Chippendale designs, and is ammusingly called "Jackendale" in Volume IV of _The Historical Harpsichord_, "Harpsichord Decoration-A Conspectus" by Sheridan Germann, p.84ff.
COMPASS: GG–g3 (5 octaves)
STOPS: none

Inscribed"Gulielmus Harris Londini Fecit 1764" in ink on name batten
Markings• "G. W. GOSS, / MUSIC DEALER / 62, BRECKNOOK ROAD, / N / 46 York Rise, Highgate / Restored / July 1898" first four lines are press printed, next line in pencil, and remainder in ink on paper label on back of name batten
• "Fricker 1764" in ink on top of key 1
• "S[l or t]ep[c or i]ons No 6" in ink on key 61
ProvenanceThought to have been purchased from antiques dealer in New York City in 1941 by family of Courtney Regen, who gave it to CWF in 2001

Exhibition(s)