Machete
1840-1870 (Made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
The machete is a small guitar with four strings, played in Portugal, Madeira and Brazil, which was adopted in Hawaii in the 1880s as the ukelele. Carl Engel (1818-1882), an eminent musicologist from Hanover and the original owner, stated that 'the tone of this present specimen is remarkably voluminous and sonorous, considering the size of the instrument'.
Object details
| Category | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | planed and joined olivewood back and sides, planed pine soundboard, planed and inlaid rosewood fingerboard with brass frets. |
| Brief description | Olivewood, rosewood and other woods, Portuguese, 1840 - 70. |
| Physical description | 'Back of a single piece of olivewood and sides of the same. Belly of two pieces of pine inlaid round edges and round the soundhole with various woods, including a type of rosewood. Neck of pine, stained black, with a rosewood fingerboard inlaid with various woods in a feather design, and with seventeen brass frets and a wooden nut. The figure-of-eight shaped head has four pegs for four single strings.' - Anthony Baines:Catalogue of Musical Instruments in the Victoria and Albert Museum - Part II: Non-keyboard instruments (London, 1998), p. 62. |
| Dimensions |
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| Object history | This instrument was lent to the South Kensington Museum by its owner, Carl Engel (1818-1882), in 1874, and subsequently bought by the museum in 1882 for £2 - 10 - 0 (£2.50). Engel was an eminent musicologist from Hanover, who published the Descriptive Catalogue of the Musical Instruments in the South Kensington Museum in 1874. The South Kensington Museum has been known as the Victoria & Albert Museum since 1899. |
| Summary | The machete is a small guitar with four strings, played in Portugal, Madeira and Brazil, which was adopted in Hawaii in the 1880s as the ukelele. Carl Engel (1818-1882), an eminent musicologist from Hanover and the original owner, stated that 'the tone of this present specimen is remarkably voluminous and sonorous, considering the size of the instrument'. |
| Bibliographic references |
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| Collection | |
| Accession number | 203-1882 |
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| Record created | June 24, 2009 |
| Record URL |
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