information:classification
Flageolets

The word flageolet has been used since the sixteenth century to refer to small duct flutes, and the instrument is sometimes designated using general terms such as flautino and flauto piccolo, complicating identification of its earliest form. It was first described by Mersenne in Harmonie universelle (1636) as having four fingers holes on the front and two thumb holes on the back, with a lowest note C6 and a compass of two octaves. Like the recorder, the upper thumb hole is used as an octaving vent. Flageolets were generally small flutes; however, their lowest note varies. They were initially popular in France, and it is from there that the flageolet first arrived in England in the seventeenth century, becoming a popular amateur instrument, as the recorder later did. Indeed, when the recorder was introduced to England, it was presented as an easy instrument for those who already played the flageolet, and the earliest English recorder tutors are notated in the flageolet tablature of the time, called "dot-way". Notably, the diarist and naval administrator Samuel Pepys (1633–1703) and his wife were both amateur players of the flageolet, and Pepys was later an amateur recorder player.

Starting in the early 1800s, a number of innovations were introduced to the flageolet, including the addition of keys to extend its range and allow it to more easily play accidentals. They also included solutions to the problem of condensation: most commonly, a sea sponge was placed inside the wind chamber (the conical chamber above the windway) to soak up moisture. More novel solutions such as the insertion of a thin wooden wedge into the windway, the drilling of little holes in the side of the block to drain condensation, and a complex system for draining condensation through a hollowed-out block were also developed. Around 1800 in England, the recorder ("English flute," see Name) came to be called an "English flageolet," appropriating the name of the more fashionable instrument. From at least this time to the present, the flageolet in its first form has been called the French flageolet to differentiate it from the so-called English flageolet.

From around 1803, when the London instrument maker William Bainbridge obtained a number of patents for improvements to the English flageolet, instruments were often referred as "improved" or "patent" flageolets with little reference to how they actually differed from their predecessors. In this period, the instrument had six finger holes and single thumb hole, and had as many as six keys. Tarasov reports that the English flageolets of the late eighteenth century had six finger holes and no thumb hole, and later regained the thumb hole and seventh finger hole (see above, right). The English flageolet never reached the level of popularity that the "French" flageolet enjoyed in the nineteenth century, possibly because the latter instrument was louder. Both remained popular until the beginning of the twentieth century.

A significant amount of music was written for the flageolet in the nineteenth century, such as the etudes of Narcisse Bousquet, although much of it was directed at amateurs.

English flageolets that may qualify as recorders are of two types: those early instruments, called "English flageolets," which were actually recorders, and nineteenth-century instruments with seven finger holes and a thumb hole. These instruments are not typically regarded as recorders; however, Tarasov has argued for their inclusion in the family.