My recent musings about a 1875 De Santis mandolin have led me to get interested in the early, pre-Embergher Roman production in the 1860s and 1870s: mandolins with a rather uniform appearance, sober style, with few decorations, usually a maple back and neck, and the so-called Roman pegs, wooden with a brass rod inserted inside.
Has anyone got material about this obscure era of mandolin-making, or instruments of that sort?
Here are a few images from the collection of the musical instrument museum in Rome. The first one by Biaggio Molinari, the next ones anonymous.
This is taken from the Method for mandolin playing, by Giuseppe Branzoli, Rome 1875, that clearly depicts that style of mandolin as the "old style", alongside Petroni's innovations.
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