The Gottweig Music Archive is housed at the Gottweig Benedictine Archive and Library in lower Austria; it is located about 1 hour’s drive from Vienna. In 2000, an unassuming lutenist was searching for lute scores in the Archive, and stumbled across a group of 24 anonymous manuscripts in tablature that clearly were not written for lute. The manuscripts were for viola d’amore. 

While there was no author indicated, the style of many of the pieces were clearly in the style and use of the instrument from Austrian Heinrich Biber (1644-1704).  Suite #19 is almost definitely by Biber, and was probably composed in the late 1600’s.  Biber wrote one of the most important pieces ever written for viola d’amore with his Partita #7 for two violas d’amore, as part of the Harmonia Artificioso.