Tudor
The Tudor is an early New York-made
Epiphone Masterbilt archtop that is
primarily interesting because of its
extreme rarity. Only a handful of them
have been documented in current
existence, with around fifty or so
being originally made between 1934
and 1936. In most respects the Tudor
wasn’t much different from Epiphone’s
other archtops of the era, like the
more common DeLuxe and Broadway
models. Its original sale price in the
1934 Epiphone catalog was 225 dollars
(around 4000 bucks in 2017 money),
so it was defnitely not a budget
guitar, but it was significantly more
affordable than an Emperor. That said,
its construction was quite similar to the
flagship model, with a carved spruce
top, curly maple back and sides, three-
piece neck, and rosewood fretboard.
It was only available in the smaller
Grand Auditorium size and only had a
single finish option, which may have
contributed to its small production
numbers and eventual discontinuation.
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