Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - A Myth Busted: the Famous OTTHEINRICH Wheellock Arquebus Dated 1533!

Matchlock · 29th December 2013, 02:34 PM

Hi there,

I realize you had to be patiently waiting for me a long time to carry on and post the real thing, i.e., bust the myth that this gun can be regarded seriously with the eyes of weaponry.

I must admit that I was planning to wait for a better day to come for my bad spine and legs that would enable me to attend the Bavarian Army Museum Ingolstadt 30 km away once more and take better and up-to-date photos of that Ottheinrich arquebus. That day sadly did not come and the weather at this time of the year is just too dreary to take promising images in a museum with rooms as horribly darkened as in Ingolstadt.

Thus I have to resort to my older images, hoping that they will reveal what I am trying to show.

In post #2 above I stated that the present wheellock mechanism may not be the original and has at least been crudely altered in order to evoke a more archaic impression, for what reason ever.

This came from an old noble collection and was sold at auction at the Dorotheum, Vienna, from February 29 to March 2nd, 1912, where the newly founded Bavarian National Museum Munich bought it, and since 1972 it has been on display in the Bavarian Army Museum Ingolstadt.
We can see from the photos of 1912 that the lock looked just the way it looks today, with the pyrite dog an inadequate association of a ca. 1600 musket to a lock of 1533 (see b/w attachments). Minor staghorn filets were missing from the upper brim of the forestock but they were replaced in the correct manner.

Lock mechanisms of identical shape and date prove what the original dog and dog spring looked like. There is a finely preserved detached lock of ca. 1530-35 in the Dresden armory, and another with the same makers mark mounted on a complete long arquebus in the Royal Armouries Leeds. So we can also tell that the original sickle-shaped dog spring encircling the wheel has been removed and replaced - not modernzied! - but in the incorrect style, with unequally long arms of the mid-16th c.! Had the spring corresponded in style to the dog, we would have accepted the alteration as a homogeneous late-16th c. modernization for another shooter. The fact of deliberately choosing an obsolete form, however, and, what is even more, an inapt one, plus adding a substantial portion to the fore end of the lock plate just to accomodate that ultra long dog spring, makes me think of some forger - who, luckily was incompetent ...

On the outer side of the lock plate we can still make out the refilled spaces where different parts of the former action (now missing) were riveted. I am sure that I would find further evidence of forgery if I was allowed to take out the lock ... Well, it is not really that important. You and I can tell by the diffefrent contours of the lock and stock that the present lock mechanism is probably not the original.

For the moment being, the fact is sad enough that an arquebus dated 1533 that once belonged to one of the most influential noble men of the 16th century, and a close friend of Henry VIII, is no better preserved than Henry VIII's two surviving personal guns, the wheellock mechanisms of which are missing. If it were mine, I would present it without the present lock. It looks almost as ridiculous as one of Henry's guns with the barbaricially 'reconstructed' 'matchlock' (with a serpentine and lockplate in shapes that never ever existed, let alone in 1537!, at present on display at the Mary Rose Museum Portsmouth).

Résumé: The lock mechanism does, in all probability, not originally belong and should consequently be removed. Presented together as a unity, this 'unholy' union evokes the impression of a unanimous gun - which definitley is put at dispute.

Please see also my thread on Henry VIII's two breechloading arquebuses, one dated 1537, the other ca. 1540:
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...634#post164634

Best,
Michael

29th December 2013, 02:34 PM	#6
Matchlock (deceased) Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Bavaria, Germany - the center of 15th and 16th century gunmaking Posts: 4,310	Hi there, I realize you had to be patiently waiting for me a long time to carry on and post the real thing, i.e., bust the myth that this gun can be regarded seriously with the eyes of weaponry. I must admit that I was planning to wait for a better day to come for my bad spine and legs that would enable me to attend the Bavarian Army Museum Ingolstadt 30 km away once more and take better and up-to-date photos of that Ottheinrich arquebus. That day sadly did not come and the weather at this time of the year is just too dreary to take promising images in a museum with rooms as horribly darkened as in Ingolstadt. Thus I have to resort to my older images, hoping that they will reveal what I am trying to show. In post #2 above I stated that the present wheellock mechanism may not be the original and has at least been crudely altered in order to evoke a more archaic impression, for what reason ever. This came from an old noble collection and was sold at auction at the Dorotheum, Vienna, from February 29 to March 2nd, 1912, where the newly founded Bavarian National Museum Munich bought it, and since 1972 it has been on display in the Bavarian Army Museum Ingolstadt. We can see from the photos of 1912 that the lock looked just the way it looks today, with the pyrite dog an inadequate association of a ca. 1600 musket to a lock of 1533 (see b/w attachments). Minor staghorn filets were missing from the upper brim of the forestock but they were replaced in the correct manner. Lock mechanisms of identical shape and date prove what the original dog and dog spring looked like. There is a finely preserved detached lock of ca. 1530-35 in the Dresden armory, and another with the same makers mark mounted on a complete long arquebus in the Royal Armouries Leeds. So we can also tell that the original sickle-shaped dog spring encircling the wheel has been removed and replaced - not modernzied! - but in the incorrect style, with unequally long arms of the mid-16th c.! Had the spring corresponded in style to the dog, we would have accepted the alteration as a homogeneous late-16th c. modernization for another shooter. The fact of deliberately choosing an obsolete form, however, and, what is even more, an inapt one, plus adding a substantial portion to the fore end of the lock plate just to accomodate that ultra long dog spring, makes me think of some forger - who, luckily was incompetent ... On the outer side of the lock plate we can still make out the refilled spaces where different parts of the former action (now missing) were riveted. I am sure that I would find further evidence of forgery if I was allowed to take out the lock ... Well, it is not really that important. You and I can tell by the diffefrent contours of the lock and stock that the present lock mechanism is probably not the original. For the moment being, the fact is sad enough that an arquebus dated 1533 that once belonged to one of the most influential noble men of the 16th century, and a close friend of Henry VIII, is no better preserved than Henry VIII's two surviving personal guns, the wheellock mechanisms of which are missing. If it were mine, I would present it without the present lock. It looks almost as ridiculous as one of Henry's guns with the barbaricially 'reconstructed' 'matchlock' (with a serpentine and lockplate in shapes that never ever existed, let alone in 1537!, at present on display at the Mary Rose Museum Portsmouth). Résumé: The lock mechanism does, in all probability, not originally belong and should consequently be removed. Presented together as a unity, this 'unholy' union evokes the impression of a unanimous gun - which definitley is put at dispute. Please see also my thread on Henry VIII's two breechloading arquebuses, one dated 1537, the other ca. 1540: http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...634#post164634 Best, Michael Attached Images Last edited by Matchlock; 30th December 2013 at 01:06 PM.