Baryton

'Pine belly with 'comma' soundholes and double purfling. Back of sycamore. The body shape is without lower corners at the waist and with a two-lobed bottom. The finely carved neck, with masks on either side at the root, has a top face veneered with engraved ivory, the whole pierced to form a wavy floral scroll pattern. The partitioned pegbox has the sides carved in relief with acanthus bordering, and the back pierced and carved with fine floral scrolls and strapwork. The finial is a carved figure of Orpheus playing a lyre, with putti below. Of six original pegs for the playing strings, two have been removed and their holes filled. Wrest pins for twenty-five wire sympathetic strings are distributed across both halves of the pegbox. The wires run to an oblique fixed bridge with hitch-rail immediately below. Tailpiece, attached to an asymmetrically placed hook-bar, and fingerboard are decorated with marquetry of engraved ivory on tortoiseshell with figures in classical dress, and with strapwork.' Anthony Baines, Catalogue of Musical Instruments in the Victoria and Albert Museum - Part II: Non-Keyboard Instruments (London, 1978), pp. 12-13.