Hi Michael, and everybody else!
At first I would like to write a few words about the cranequin in post #276.
I think this could also be a cranequin that is bit older than 1550-1560. My guess is as early as 1500-1520 maybe. This piece has a combination of an older looking tooth bar and a younger looking housing.
The hooks on the tooth bar that grips the string is of a late 15th c style, not usually seen in the late 16th c. They are most often of a more robust type and a simpler in shape. The tooth bar looks like it is a bit wider than it is high; in the 15th c they usually were more or less as wide as they were high. I can’t see if it has a lighting grove in the tooth bar, which would also be a 16th c feature.
The housing on the other hand looks like a quite simple cranequin, not something fancy for showing off at the latest hunting trips, but a good working type of cranequin. The housing looks a bit wider than the 15th c cranequins. The holder for the rope ring has a flat bottom, and not a curved one as in the 15th c; they were made flat because the 16th c crossbow tillers were built wider where the cranequin stood on the tiller. Many late 15th c crossbows have pressure marks in this area because the tiller is to thin/weak.
My own taste is for the late 15th c crossbows. I don’t like the more robust tiller that came in the 16th and later centuries as much, but with the late 15th c crossbows the makers had a crossbow where the form had won over function. There are many examples of pressure marks from the cranequin on the tiller, broken side horn plates at the nut and banana shaped tillers, where the tiller is higher at the ends than at the nut.
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