Andrea Amati was a luthier, from Cremona, Italy.Amati is credited with making the first instruments of the violin family that are in the form we use today.According to the National Music Museum in Vermillion, South Dakota:Several of his instruments survive to the present day, and some of them can still be played.Many of the surviving instruments were among a consignment of 38 instruments delivered to Charles IX of France in 1564.