Beautiful rifle
Sorry I can't help with the inscription either, in fact I even have one of my own I should post at some point. But I can offer a possible explanation as to the rising interest in these based on my own behaviour. I started collecting these a couple of years ago mostly because swords were getting difficult to ship due to many restrictions in different countries e.g. ebay.co.uk will not carry them, some postal services will not carry them, add customs difficulties and often shipping becomes too expensive for lower priced ethnographic weapons. No restrictions on these old muzzle loaders though, and that, combined with low prices made them an attractive 'second string'. Of course now I'm hooked so the only problem is that I'll need a bigger house if I want to put too many of these on the wall