The history of the violin’s development is closely linked to the emergence of local centres of violin making. Füssen, Cremona, Brescia and Venice are considered the earliest important centres.
Lute makers from Füssen and Venice were already engaged in close economic exchange in the 16th century. Cremona flourished as an independent centre between about 1550 and 1750, exerting unparalleled influence on the entire European violin making industry. The rise of instrumental music in the Italian Baroque period led to a golden age of violin making in Italy until the late 18th century.
Development in France began later. In France, the school of ‘Vieux Paris’ developed at a time when the first great era of violin making reached its zenith and terminus in Cremona with Antonio Stradivari. Paris and the small Vosges town of Mirecourt became important centres of French violin making in the 19th and 20th centuries.
In Germany, two additional centres emerged over the course of the centuries: Mittenwald and Markneukirchen. Here, the industrialisation of the 19th and 20th centuries led to a peak in the production of stringed instruments.