1890s French-made JTL 4/4 Violin

I worked on this violin for one of our local USPS drivers, and it was filthy when it came in. I eventually cleaned it up to its present state and, in doing so, found tiny labels on the inside -- one of which was the JTL "crown" label for Jerome Thibouville-Lamy (a big French maker) and the other was a "3" -- presumably having to do with the model. It's a well-made instrument, is (surprisingly) crack-free, and after work plays well and has a direct, sweet, mids-oriented voice.

Work on it included regluing many seam separations, fitting a replacement bridge and soundpost, adding some replacement pegs from my parts-bins, a new nut, and a good setup with John Pearse Mezzo (like Dominants) strings.

The bone nut is a little wonky on the eyes, but serves.

The fingerboard appears to be grimy old ebony.

The tailpiece's tailgut is still the original stuff as I was trying to keep costs to a minimum for the customer. Note the quite old-style fine-tuner which is "levered" in its adjustment scheme.

This has a nice, one-piece, flamed maple back.