Viola d'amore

strings: 7 stopped, 7 sympathetic; topmost peg on rh. Back: flat, gently angled to the neck, of 1 piece of sycamore. Purfling: simple, reverted at the button into a pointed trefoil, with another smaller added above. Belly: 2 pieces of pine. Soundholes: pointed f's (102mm) without top and bottom holes, but with a small hole 3/4 of the way down the inner edge. Ribs: flush with the plates. Modern fingerboard and top nut of ebony; tailpiece bulbous and waisted, obliquely cut across front edge, with an oval metal plate attached near the end; the end-gut leads to a violin-type end-pin over an old (stained) nut; the sympathetic strings go to brass pins in an old ebony plate (where 7 more holes have been filled in). 14 pegs, of ebony, with small circles of pearl inlaid in the ends. Neck: hollowed out for the sympathetic strings to pass under the fingerboard. Neck and head (original) angled as for violin. Pegbox: 200mm long, stepped down in a curve from a point just over half way from the nut; open at the back for the sympathetic strings to pass behind the upper pegs. Head: a plain scroll with flat bosses. Inside: 3 cross-bars, bass-bar and soundpost. Length 795, back 398, width 186/126/235, depth 62/56