(It.).
In Italy a name for any small duct flute or whistle. It was first described in the 14th century (Marcuse, 1964) as having two front finger-holes and a rear thumb-hole (it thus falls into the normal pattern for three-hole pipes; see Pipe and tabor). It was traditionally carved from boxwood and had a conical bore. The narrow compass obtainable from the three finger-holes could be extended to over two octaves by stopping and half-stopping the bell with the palm of the hand, and by overblowing. In Sicily the term applies to a larger duct flute with a wide-beak mouthpiece and six finger-holes.
A larger, much improved zuffolo (lowest note c'') appeared during the early 17th century. According to Van der Meer this ‘was also called flautino and flauto piccolo in works by Monteverdi, Praetorius, Schütz, Schein and Telemann; Keiser alone maintains the original name’. The Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg, houses a few three-hole duct flutes, some with f'' as the lowest note; instruments such as these were also referred to as flautino, flauto piccolo, and even flautino piccolo by Schein, Telemann and Schürmann, although Keiser again retained the term zuffolo (see Van der Meer). The existence of similarly constructed instruments at different pitches might explain the varied ranges which are found in Keiser's opera scores: Croesus (1711 and 1730) and Jodelet (1726) both have solo passages for zuffolo (both occurring in pastoral scenes) with parts extending from a' to d'''; Tomyris (1717), however, calls for traverso [flute] o zuffolo, and the part has a range of g' to e'''.
A zuffolo of about 8 cm in length was mentioned by Grassineau (A Musical Dictionary, 1740) as being used to teach birds to sing. This instrument was popularized in London by the blind musician Picco in 1856 and, having become known as the Picco pipe, was manufactured as a toy into the 20th century.
There has been much confusion about the 18th-century zuffolo. Bonanni (Gabinetto armonico, 1722) described the ciufolo del villano as that small shawm (ciaramella) which is used in conjunction with the bagpipe (zampognari) in the Abruzzi for dancing. This is no reason for concluding, as some have done, that Keiser's zuffolo was a small shawm; indeed he actually imitated the zampognari in Croesus, using oboes and bassoons. Kleefeld claimed that this zuffolo was neither flageolet nor shawm, but panpipes, basing his view on another item in Bonanni's list (ciufolo: panpipes), on Walther's conjecture that ciufolo pastorale meant panpipes and on V.-C. Mahillon's observation that panpipes were sometimes called zoffolo pastorale in Lombardy.
WaltherML
V.-C. Mahillon: Catalogue descriptif & analytique du Musée instrumental du Conservatoire royal de musique de Bruxelles (Ghent and Brussels, 1880–1922/R; i, 2/1893/R; ii, 2/1909/R)
W. Kleefeld: ‘Das Orchester der Hamburger Oper 1678–1738’, SIMG, i (1899–1900), 219–89
S. Marcuse: Musical Instruments: a Comprehensive Dictionary (New York, 1964/R)
J.H. van der Meer: Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nürnberg: Wegweiser durch die Sammlung historischer Musikinstrumente (Nuremberg, 1971)
J.A. FULLER MAITLAND/ANTHONY C. BAINES/MARY TÉREY-SMITH