Ironwood
Ironwood - one name that is used for many different trees from different locations from the Americas to Africa to Australia. In the bow-making world, it is a catch-all for diverse South-American woods - Pau Ferro, various different sub-species of Swartia - Wamara and Katalox - their common feature being their dark colour, their straight grain and their density.
We have bows from the late 18th and early 19th centuries made from ‘ironwood’ - and it seems quite possible (likely) that it was also used earlier. Pierre Trichet in his Traité des Instruments de Musique (1631) suggests that bows of brazilwood, ebony … and other solid wood, are the best …
. Trichet's ‘brazilwood’ could equally be be snakewood, pernambuco or some form of ironwood.
It's a very dense wood, lending a particularly focussed sound to its bows. It's not to everyone's taste - but as I work more with it, I find it is very successful at the extreme ends of the spectrum. Bows for Double Bass, where its density works very much in its favour, and the extremely thin Biber
bows. Here, while it might not be as warm as snakewood, it gives bows a lovely feeling as you draw them across the strings, and an ability to dig out a deep rich sound especially from the lower strings - but without going shrill on the top. Here is an ironwood bow with a boxwood frog, inspired by the Salzburg Biber
bows:
