MUSICAL INSTRUMENT MAKING IN GEORGIAN LONDON, 1753–1809: EVIDENCE FROM THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE OLD BAILEY AND THE MIDDLESEX SESSIONS OF THE PEACE

Abstract

Throughout the Georgian period London was the most significant British centre for musical instrument manufacture. Traditionally, research in this area has focused on the surviving instruments themselves, thereby emphasizing those makers in charge of flourishing workshops and those who were in the habit of signing their products. By examining archival sources, however, it is possible to glean a more complete picture of musical instrument production, through the identification of ‘hidden’ makers unrepresented by extant instruments, the establishment of patterns of settlement and the highlighting of relationships between different builders.Two principal sources form the basis of this study: the online edition of the Proceedings of the Old Bailey and the Middlesex Sessions of the Peace Records. While these sources are an important record of crime and punishment, it is the unwitting testimony of the trials rather than the crimes, the legal procedures or the punishments that is the primary focus of this study. Indeed, since the trials enable the identification of people involved at all levels of the musical instrument trade, it is arguable that they provide one of the most significant means of establishing some of the processes characterizing the industry during the second half of the eighteenth century.