View Single Post
Old 17th December 2013, 07:49 PM   #40
Matchlock
(deceased)
 
Matchlock's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: Bavaria, Germany - the center of 15th and 16th century gunmaking
Posts: 4,310
Default

Hi Raf,


Thanks, of course I have Howard Blackmore's Guns & Rifles of the World, I had just completely forgotten about those tiny two prints. It's a riddle to me how this fragment should be in Vienna. It was not there when I was.

None of the Venice crossbows (more details attached) can, according to the elongated muzzle section, be any earlier that ca. 1520; I would say 'ca. 1520-35' for all of them. The 'foot'/base of the pyrite dog and the overall shape of the dog are much more evolved than the one on the Munich crossbow combination, and screws obviously were widely in use already when these Venice combinations were made ...
The earliest-type of lock mechanidsm is that on the wheellock-axe combination, ca. 1515-20, two screws only!, see bottom attachments.


Best,
m
Attached Images
         
Matchlock is offline   Reply With Quote