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Paubrasilia echinata is recognized as the best wood in the manufacture of high-quality bows for string instruments. The wood anatomy of five historic French violin bows of the 19th and 20th century made of Pernambuco wood were investigated in order to reveal the wood anatomic features of these historical bows, to determine which P. echinata morphotype (arruda , café or laranja) was used in their manufacture and to identify the state of origin of the wood. Five bow samples were compared to 33 P. echinata specimens from the Brazilian states of Rio de Janeiro, Bahia, Paraíba and Rio Grande do Norte. The wood anatomical features were compared by means of principal component analysis, which revealed the type of axial parenchyma and percentage of tissue to be the most important to sort specimens. The best wood anatomical features previously described for high-quality bows were corroborated here and the bows in general showed similar wood anatomical features. Based on wood anatomy we found that the violin bows were most similar to the samples from the arruda morphotype derived from the States of Paraíba and Rio Grande do Norte by presenting scanty, unilateral and vasicentric axial parenchyma without confluences forming bands, higher percentage of fibres and lower percentage of axial parenchyma. We can therefore suggest that the historical French violin bows studied here were all made of the arruda morphotype from the Brazilian Northeast region helping explain the preference of the French explorers for this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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We identified the wood of the sticks of eight bows in the historical collection of musical instruments in the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence. Wood identification was carried out non-invasively (i.e., without sampling wood from the original objects), because the removal of samples from fine musical instruments will affect their aesthetic integrity and/or functional quality. Identification attempts using reflected light microscopy of wood surfaces, gave only partial results due to the poor quality of the surfaces and the particular geometry of the sticks that does not have any transverse surface. Application of Synchrotron light X-ray microtomography (μCT) in phase-contrast mode to the whole sticks allowed us to obtain stacks of transverse-sectional images that, processed as virtual volumes, revealed several anatomical features. With μCT it was possible to identify three bows as Brosimum guianense (Moraceae), one bow as Caesalpinia echinata (Caesalpiniaceae), and four bows as Manilkara sp. (Sapotaceae). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Caesalpinia echinata Lam. (pernambuco or pau-brasil) is recognized as the premier raw material for manufacturing stringed instrument bows. Several studies have identified properties considered important in determining the suitability of pernambuco wood for bow manufacture including density, modulus of elasticity (MOE), and, possibly, microfibril angle (MFA). No research has been conducted on how these properties vary within individual trees; however, an understanding of how pernambuco wood properties vary within trees is important as it may assist in the identification of trees or provenances most suited for the establishment of plantations, aid in developing an understanding of management practices on wood property variation for plantation-grown pernambuco and also facilitate the identification of regions within trees that possess optimal properties for bow manufacture. Radial variation in density, MFA and MOE was examined using SilviScan for three radial strips representing differing levels of wood quality in terms of perceived suitability for making high-quality bows. The lowest quality sample showed considerable radial variation compared to the higher quality samples for all properties and it also had the lowest average density. It was not possible to identify a strong pith to bark trend for any of the wood properties examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]