Tarisio,
Luigi (born
Fontaneto, nr. Novaro, Piedmont, c1790, died
Milan, October 1854). Italian violin dealer
and collector. He was born of humble parents
and is said to have trained as a carpenter,
with violin playing as a hobby. He developed
an interest in violins themselves, and with
a natural talent both as a connoisseur and
for business he began to acquire and resell
some of the many fine instruments that were
lying unused in the towns and villages of
northern Italy. His first journey to Paris
(in 1827) was evidently profitable for him
and for the dealers there, who gave him
every encouragement. In the same year he
made his greatest coup, acquiring a number
of violins from Count Cozio of Salabue,
including a 1716 Stradivari in unused
condition. This violin was Tarisio's
treasure, and as he spoke of it on every
visit to Paris but never actually brought it
with him, it came to be known as the
'Messiah'. Tarisio searched indefatigably
for violins and had a true love of them. The
novelist Charles Reade, who knew Tarisio,
wrote of him: 'The man's whole soul was in
fiddles. He was a great dealer, but a
greater amateur, for he had gems by him no
money would buy'. An insatiable demand in
northern Europe for what nobody wanted or
appreciated in the south, and the absence of
much competition, gave him unique
opportunites; and by bringing his stock to
Paris, the only place where the art of
restoration was at all advanced, he rescued
many great instruments for posterity. After
his death it was the turn of Vuillaume, the
leading Parisian dealer, to make the
greatest purchase of his life. At a small
farm near Fontaneto, where Tarisio's
relatives lived, were the six finest violins
of the collection, including the celebrated
'Messiah'; and in a dingy attic in Milan,
where Tarisio's body has been found, were no
fewer than 24 Stradivaris and 120 other
Italian masterpieces.
