Jew's harp news from Jewsharper

Updated news items will appear periodically here

Jew’s harp man becomes Chair of EFDSS |
The Jew’s harp making capital of the world |
Coming up trumps
Piper Heaugh – the lost Jew’s harp village |
New articles – with 2005 additions

Chair of EFDSS

Michael Wright was elected as Chair of the English Folk Dance and Song Society in December, 2005.
While not directly related to the study or playing of the Jew’s harp, becoming Chair of the National body for the promotion of English culture will, by its very nature, provide opportunities for the promotion of this underrated musical instrument.
“There is much to do, but having been on the National Council for the last three years, I am confident the new Council will work as a team to bring English cultural traditions to a greater audience than it has at the present.”

The Jew’s harp making capital of the world

Throughout the 19th and for first half of the 20th century, the region encompassed by Dudley, Rowley Regis and north & west Birmingham can rightly be described as the Jew’s harp making capital of the world.
In an article to be published shortly by the Journal of the International Jew’s Harp Society, Michael Wright provides an overview of what we know of the makers of the 19th century, including previously unpublished photographs and references to around 70 makers and manufacturers.
The Barnsley, Troman and Jones families all feature, along with many of the other children, teenage girls, young men and octogenarians who produced masses of instruments, many of which were destined for export throughout the world.
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Coming up trumps

A document from 1481 has been uncovered that is proving to have some of the most important information we have about that most simple of musical instruments, the Jew’s harp, or as it was commonly also known, the Jew’s trump. Following a lead from the Oxford English Dictionary editorial staff working on the 3rd edition and the London Record Society, Michael Wright has uncovered a wealth of information on how Jew’s harps were imported into this country and who was importing them. Popular musical instruments from the past are notoriously difficult to find information about, so this find has been hailed as one of the most significant in recent times.

We now know where these musical instruments were being imported from, the name of the ship along with its master and, most importantly, the name of the merchant for whom they were intended along with a list of other items he was importing. If that was not all, we now can say for certain that the instrument was known as a Jue Harpe or Jue Trumpe during the latter part of the 15th century, and possibly much earlier.

“It’s a bit like an archaeologist finding a Viking hoard. We now have definite information on where Jew’s harps came from and who was distributing them, something we’ve only speculated about before this document came to light.”
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Piper Heaugh – the lost Jew’s harp village

Before the mass importation of the harmonica at the beginning of the last century, the Jew’s harp was one of the most popular and cheap musical instruments anyone could buy. Records show that hundreds of thousands were imported from at least the 15th century and it was thought that serious manufacturing of the instrument in the UK did not start until the Industrial Revolution, when it was centred around Dudley in the West Midlands. A recent reference sent to me, however – the original of which I have viewed in the Bodleian Library – has described a village in Scotland that would be the earliest manufacturing centre in the UK we know of to date.

In the Statistical Account of Scotland published in 1845 there is the following:
Stevenston – There was a small village of some antiquity, called Piper Heagh, of which there are still some remains in the woods at Ardeer. The inhabitants of it were chiefly trump-makers (‘Trump’ is a common word for the Jew’s harp in the North of England, Scotland and Ireland – MW); and there were some, it would appear, in Stevenston of the same profession, for in the Commission of Glasgow we find the account of the death, “in 1627, of Agnes Glasgow, spouse of John Logane, trump maker in Stevenstone.” The Trump which they manufactured at Piper-Heugh was the Jews’ Harp…

Having contacted the West Scotland Archaeological Trust, it seems that the site has never been investigated. The local museum has a Jew’s harp found on the site which is from a later period (more below), and there appears to be no record of any finds in the Treasure Trove in Scotland, National Museum of Scotland. This site, therefore, is unexplored and unique as the only pre-Industrial Revolution Jew’s harp manufactory heard of to date.
I will be visiting the site later this year to see what, if anything, remains.
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New articles

ICTM Conference – paper ‘The Value of Jew’s Harp Collections in Helping Understand Archaeological Finds’ given in August, 2005 (PDF), with extensive notes

‘The Jew’s Harp’ – mythology, fairies, evil spirits and witches, published in Folk Leads, Issue 3, Autumn 2005, www.grovefolkclub.org.uk

‘When the Black Country was the Jew’s harp capital’, published in the Black Country Bugle, February 2nd 2005.

‘Jue Harpes, Jue Trumpes, 1481’, Journal of the International Jew’s Harp Society, Spring 2005

‘Rates of Customs / Merchandizes, 1545 to 1765’, Journal of the International Jew’s Harp Society, Spring 2005