Dating a matchlock & a wheellock

[Matchlock]

Hi Trond,


Your query exactly meets my field of competency. Thus I must say right at the start that the wheellock gun is not a musket but obviously a carbine or the barrel and forestock have been drastically shortened as the shape of the butt is extremely unusual for a carbine.

Although I do need to see more close-ups of both guns, the rough dating is the same for both the heavy matchlock musket and the wheellock: ca. 1635-45, meaning high time of the Thirty Years War (1618-48).
Both seem to be of Swedish or Danish manufacture and really should have barrel marks; the barrels may have been made in either Suhl/Germany or Jönköping. What makes you think they are German?

Please do post more and good overall views and close-ups as well. And please do not clean the guns, they are in perfectly and virtually 'untouched' optimum original condition, as far as I can see!


I attach a view of the 'younger' section of my collection, showing muskets from ca. 1570-1720, with a close-up of a Suhl wheellock musket of ca. 1640 and a heavy 9 kilo (!) matchlock musket dated 1636, plus a link to my thread
A Matchlock Chronology, ca. 1520-1720: http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...ock+chronology


Best,
Michael