[Matchlock]

As to such rarissimae as matchcord:

The largest number of matchcord bundles ever deaccessioned from an armory was at Anderson Galleries in New York in 1927, when the complete 15th-17th c. contents of the Fortress of Hohenwerfen near Salzburg/Austria, the former armory of Prince Eugene, were sold at aution. Some of these were purchased by American museums like the Higgis Armory in Worcester, Massachusetts (images attached at bottom).

The Christie's bundle posted above (and reattached) was deaccessioned by the Higgins.

The Higgins comment that the relatively large diameter of that matchcord seems to denote use with linkstocks only can be denied on the grounds of some thirty original matchlock muskets from ca. 1656 -1720 in my collection: all of their serpentine jaws can be opened wide enough by the means of the wignut to receive (and clamp tight) any average matchcord.

As to my own thirty years of intense research, and as I mentioned above, only the earliest 15th to early-16th c. types of matchcord did not fit the very delicate serpentines of that period; therefore these arquebuses were lit by small pieces of smoldering tinder and should, as I have pointed out often before, be called tinderlocks instead of matchlocks. These pieces of tinder had to be lit before each shot with the thick slow match kept smoldering all the time.


The largest number of big bundles of early matchcord (22!) is housed in the famous Churburg Armory in South Tyrol, and in the armory of the Veste Coburg, Franconia (eight, photos attached). The eight Coburg bundles of snowwhite (all other samples are either yellowish or brownish!) slow match measure about 35-40 meters each.



The eperts of the leading auction houses in the world have attended my collection, and they all agree that the largest amount of matchcord in any private hands is assembled in mine.


Best,
Michael