A unique bronze barrel wall gun (doppelter Doppelhaken), Nuremberg, ca. 1515-20

[Matchlock]

Yes, Marcus,


I'm extremely proud to say that this indeed is my piece!

I ordered many extra images right before the auction from Tom Del Mar and then bought it, together with the unique combined matchlock and flintlock MONTECUCCOLI musket including its original long folding bayonet from the Stauffenberg collection in Franconia/Bavaria, where it was since it was made in 1666! This makes me only the second owner of the Montecuccoli piece after 350 years - imagine!!! Both pieces are in fine, virtualy 'untouched' and patinated condition. The Montecuccoli musket M 1666 is the one with the pierced butt in the second and third images attached.

The catalog description of the short brass-alloy barrel arquebus with the earliest kind of pre-petronel cherrywood full stock (German krummer Landsknechtkolben) was completely misreading the facts that the barrel is of Maximilian Landsknecht type, most probably cast in Maximilian I's foundry of Mühlau near Innsbruck in about 1495-1500 and struck with a characteristic Late-Gothic founder's mark, The gun obviously was restocked during the South German peasant wars (Bauernkriege) of 1525, and the primitive snap-tinderlock of that Early-Renaissance period was, obsolete by long then, 'modernized' in the High-Baroque period, when everything was badly needed that would still fire: at the end of the Thirty Years War, the 1640's, by re-using an older matchlock mechanism of ca. 1580-1600. I associated an original long tiller trigger to the gun and put it on my wall. Done!

I will post these two guns in separate threads when I can take good images in spring!
Till then, the images attached will have to do.


Best,
Michael

[Marcus den toom]

The pictures are good enough to make me go

I found a pile of pictures on the web, apparantly a nice overview site for all sorts of pictures and subjects.

http://www.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=handgonnes
http://www.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=handgonne

[Matchlock]

Many of these photos are by me!

Michael

[Marcus den toom]

I also found this book on handgonnes, but i am not sure about its scientific accuracy
"Medieval Handgonnes: The first black powder infantry weapons, by Sean Mclachlan"

http://www.amazon.com/kindle/dp/B004...ext_eos_detail

[Matchlock]

It's not expensive but I have a copy and it was not worth it. The few photos of original pieces are from the Royal Armouries Leeds and are printed tiny.
As far as the 'Medieval' site is concerned: how serious can you expect a booklet to be when the title (!) page illustrates a true Medieval long gun next to a detached wall gun barrel of ca. 1600 when the Middle Ages were over for 100 years?!

m

[Matchlock]

Another, similar and simultaneous, Nuremberg copper alloy/bronze hackbut barrel, ca. 1515-20, is preserved in the collection at Grandson castle, Switzerland.
The pan is an inapt later addition.

For both temporary and stylistic comparison, I attached another, earlier, ca. 1500-10, of characteristic French make, retaining its original pan that never had a cover (!), fitted with trunnions and cast in high relief with a coat-of-arms, from the same museum.


m