"It was part of the musical instruments department, so we weren't aware of it," Ms. Kondoleon said.
Organized by Jayson Kerr Dobney, a curator in the Met's musical instruments department, this exhibition of about 100 instruments comes in two parts.
While organizing the show, Ms. Kondoleon discovered that the museum's musical instruments department has a bronze and bone trumpet, believed to be Roman and dating from around the first or second century A.D., that was once used for the announcement of equestrian events.
The violin was appraised in 1999 for $3.5 million by the violin consultant in Christie's musical instrument department.
Recalling earlier scandals, Graham Wells, the retired director of the instrument department at Sotheby's, wonders how long the case will even be remembered.
"She was asked to meld the textile department and the musical instrument department into the European decorative arts and sculpture department, so she had three very disparate groups of curators and conservators to oversee," Ms. Chace said.
Frances Gillham, a director, previously worked in the musical-instrument department at Christie's, but says that professional musicians rarely buy at auction: they prefer a relationship with a trusted dealer.
One could infer, then, that certain Strad violins more than doubled in value in this seven-year period, says Kerry Keane, the musical-instrument department head at Christie's.
This assessment was conducted by psychiatrists who were trained and certified in the use of the study instruments at our department.
For instance, car dealers let customers go on test drives and guitar salesmen let customers play on their instruments - even department stores let customers try clothes on before they buy them.
But even though truth is within our reach, philosophy begins and ends with the quest for truth: "philosophy is meant and that is the decisive point not as a set of propositions, a teaching, or even a system, but as a way of life, a life animated by a peculiar passion, the philosophic desire, or eros; it is not understood as an instrument or a department of human self-realization" (NRH, p. 122).
