Shipping from Italy

[Athanase]

Are there paints easily reversible?
To paint flintlock rifles with ivory inlay decoration or sheaths with some small, ivory-decorated parts?

For handles ivory in revenche I do not see how to hide them discreetly.

[vilhelmsson]

Hey guys, Not to gloat (too much), but I just had a box of swords arrive in California from Italy. It shipped FedEx International Economy on Wednesday, 10/9, and was delivered in California on Friday, 10/11, before 10 am.

However, a shipment earlier in the year from the same place with UPS had a 30 day FDA and Fish & Wildlife hold, and nothing biological inside.

So I think luck is a factor.

Also, please don't circumvent CITES. It invalidates provenance and encourages fakes.

[Philip]

Originally Posted by vilhelmsson

However, a shipment earlier in the year from the same place with UPS had a 30 day FDA and Fish & Wildlife hold, and nothing biological inside.

So I think luck is a factor.

Also, please don't circumvent CITES. It invalidates provenance and encourages fakes.

Yep, the feds can't inspect every parcel. But recent experiences show that the gamble isn't worth it. Call me paranoid, but it seems to me that offenders whose shipments get snagged are put on some short of S-list. A couple years ago, a dealer in the UK used to send me items for restoration, and every single shipment of his was received with Fish and Wildlife inspection tape. Fortunately I had informed him in advance of all this that I would not work on any item affected by CITES, permits or no. He must have landed on somebody/s radar screen because several packages in a row, containing all-metal Indian ethnographic weapons, was flagged and checked.

Getting caught trying to circumvent CITES, either on purpose or inadvertently, can have consequences beyond invalidation of provenance. Like confiscation and destruction. In the recent past, the Richard Wagner Jr collection in the US was liquidated, and a noted UK-based auctioneer was selected to handle disposal of this estate. The CITES-affected pieces were to be sold out of their San Francisco saleroom, the rest sent to London. About a dozen ivory hilted daggers were mistakenly shipped in the group destined for the UK. These were seized, the handles removed and destroyed, and the blades returned to the auctioneers for sale.

[Philip]

Originally Posted by Athanase

Are there paints easily reversible?
To paint flintlock rifles with ivory inlay decoration or sheaths with some small, ivory-decorated parts?

For handles ivory in revenche I do not see how to hide them discreetly.

Back in the 1990s, when CITES enforcement was not what it is now, some dealer colleagues from the UK used to come to US antique arms fairs to buy. As a favor I would handle shipping for them, and on ivory hilts we agreed on the use of automotive spray enamel in gloss or matte black, applied without a primer. It masked the color perfectly and was safely removable with mineral spirits --without a primer it did not adhere all that well, which of course made it vulnerable to a customs inspector with sharp fingernails. But the ruse worked.

I wouldn't have tried it on any surface that included wood, however. And now I wouldn't do it at all, because enforcement is tighter and the penalty, besides a fine, includes confiscation and destruction of the item (see the post I wrote above for a nasty example). The last time I did this was for an English gent who bought a nice ivory horse head shamshir at auction in the US and the seller refused to ship overseas. The blade was a piece of crap so my customer just said to yank and toss it, the hilt was what he was after. I stress the word LAST, I no longer accept any items for restoration that contain any CITES-affected material, not just ivory. It's just not worth it.

Please, fellas -- don't cheat. And keep up on the CITES regs, as re the scope of species involved. It isn't about just ivory, tortoise, rhino and beagle feathers anymore. A friend just reported that a shipment of Oriental weapons sent to him from overseas had one item yanked -- a sword with ray skin covered handle. The inspector demanded that he prove that the species of ray fish that the hilt was covered with was not one of the endangered ones! And keeping in mind that most Japanese swords have ray skin of one species or another under the silk wrapping, you can see where this could possibly lead. And it wasn't too long ago that the Gibson guitar factory was shut down for awhile until the feds verified the source of one lot of African ebony that luthiers use for fingerboards on the necks of instruments.