Wolfgang Wolff

Wolfgang Wolff (* around 1515 in Bernbeuren (?); † 1570 in Füssen) worked as a civil lute maker in Füssen .

Archive documents

The lute maker Wolfgang Wolff is well documented in the archives. Cardinal Otto Truchseß von Waldburg gave him 36 guilders for eight lutes, for their transport in a "Neckarsfaß" (wine barrel) to Augsburg a further 16 kreuzers and for his children 8 kreuzers. In 1547 he was paid 3 guilders for two small lutes on the orders of the cardinal. In 1551, the sexton of the Sankt Mang monastery recorded the payment of 2 Kreutzer for the boy of the lute maker Wolff. In 1571 a daughter of Wolfgang Wolff married Jakob Möst von Furt near Sameister , who then also ran the lute maker in Füssen. A Simon Straub from Horn near Schwangau married another daughter of Wolfgang Wolff in 1578. Whether there is a connection with the musical instrument maker Straub from Friedenweiler in the Black Forest has not yet been clearly clarified. An indication of this, however, is that the first name Simon occurs several times in the Straub Peace Forest.

Origin and descendant

Wolfgang Wolff was presumably a descendant of Georg Wolff, who on October 10, 1493 acquired the citizenship of Füssen as a lute maker . Georg Wolf was probably a member of the Lopez-Lupus-Wolf family of musicians, who came from Moorish Spain. As Sephardic Jews , the Lopez were forced to emigrate in the course of the Reconquista (conquest of the Moorish Granada) and persecution by the Catholic Inquisition of 1492 and moved east.

Wolfgang Wolff died around 1570 because his heirs paid his death tax .

A son, also with the first name Wolfgang (* around 1515 in Füssen; † February 11, 1591 in Füssen), continued his craft as a lute maker.

Instruments

• Museum of the City of Füssen: Lute (Inv.No. 4669)

Mid- 16th century ; Lute shell made of 15 yew wood shavings with glued-in manufacturer's label "Wolfgang Wolf zue Fießen".

In 1646 the Wolf lute was converted into a "French lute". According to the baroque music needs, the neck was lengthened in order to reach lower vocal ranges. This extremely rare specimen of a twelve-course lute comes from a time when Jacques Gaultier was experimenting with new tuning of the lute in France .

With this renovation, a new box was made, which is papered with rare copper engravings by Dutch masters of the 17th century.

literature

• Gabriele Dinsenbacher : Lutes, violins, organs. Füssen, the city of instrument making , City Museum, Füssen 1999 (exhibition catalog)