Note 44 — INTRODUCTION.

In the preface to the violoncello tutor already mentioned, by Corrette, the untenable assertion is made that the violoncello was discovered by Bonocin (Buononcini), “preséntement Maître de Chapelle du Roi de Portugal.” A Bononcini, with the Christian name of Domenico, actually lived in 1737 at the Lisbon Court. At that period, according to Fétis, he must have been eighty-five years old. He must therefore have been born in 1652. He could not have invented the violoncello (if one could call it an invention), as it evidently existed before his birth. It is not even certain that Domenico Bononcini was a cellist. Possibly Corrette confounded him with Giov. Battista Bononcini mentioned later.