[Illustration: Music]

[Illustration: Figure 3.--POLYGONAL VIRGINAL REMOVED FROM OUTER CASE.]

The Typical Italian Polygonal Virginal

To give a clear idea of the construction of the Italian polygonal
virginal, a detailed description of one particular example is presented
here. This virginal is included in the Hugo Worch collection at the U.S.
National Museum. The maker's name is not known, but the instrument is
believed to have been built around 1600.

As is true of the great majority of Italian virginals and harpsichords
of the 16th and 17th centuries, the instrument proper is removable from
its outer case. The outer case (fig. 2), of sturdier construction than
the virginal which it was designed to protect, is made of wood about
1/2" thick and is decorated with paintings of female figures and
garlands. The original legs are missing.

Our main interest is in the virginal proper (fig. 3), the construction
of which is comparable in some ways to that of the violin. The very thin
sides of the virginal are held together at the corners by blocks, and
the soundboard is supported by a lining.

The cross section drawing (fig. 4) shows the 9/16" thick bottom and the
sides which are 1/8" thick. The lining, 1/2" by 1-1/3", runs around four
sides of the instrument, the wrest plank replacing it on the fifth side.
The soundboard thickness, measured inside the holes through which the
jacks pass, varies from 1/16" in the bass to 1/8" in the treble. The
manner in which variations in thickness are distributed over the entire
soundboard has not been determined. The cross section drawing also shows
the beautifully executed mouldings that make the sides appear to be
thicker than they really are.

The positions of the knee braces, the shape of which can be seen in
figure 4, are shown along either side of the keyboard in figure 5. These
braces are 3/4" thick. The positions of the blocks, small pieces with
the grain running perpendicular to the bottom, and the wrest plank,
which is 1-1/4" thick, are also shown. The two ribs are attached to the
underside of the soundboard in the positions indicated. The jack guide,
built up of separate pieces held together by long strips down either
side, is glued to the underside of the soundboard and extends as far as
the lining in the treble but stops a little short of it in the bass
(fig. 5). The jack guide is 15/16" thick.

The layout of the soundboard in figure 6 gives the relative positions