______________ Roman M. Turovsky http://polyhymnion.org/swv
> From: "Jon Murphy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 04:05:36 -0500 > To: "Bonnie Shaljean" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "Roman > Turovsky" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: Re: Wire strings > > then someone might > have beaten it thinner. The making of metal linkages goes back a long way, > key bolts for stone structures go back 3000 years. Let us not assume that > some old boy didn't make wire, whatever that is. (When does a long thin > piece of metal stop being a bar and become wire? I guess when you can bend > it and sew something together with it.) > > OK, "drawn wire". Malleable metals have the ability to take shape when > drawn through an orifice. That makes for a more consistant wire than a > beaten one. But early gut strings, made by twisting "cat gut" (whether from > a sheep or pig, or whatever) were inconsistant in longitudinal density, as > was beaten wire. > In fact I'll make a guess here, I think it was probably > easier to make a consistant beaten wire than a consistEnt gut. Put the wire > under tension and use a light hammer to pound out the thick points. Take a guitar string and try it. > But that > is just a guess as I haven't tried it. But we do know that once the gut is > twisted the anomalies in the guage (density) will be locked into it. > > I state the thesis that string making was an art, not a science. And that > making wire strings might have been easier than gut. If this were less silly it would have been better to refer it to professional stringmakers. But as it is................................... RT To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
