A Very Rare Nuremberg Arquebus 'Bronze'/Brass Barrel, ca. 1500-10

[Matchlock]

You really are a great observer, Alexender!

Honestly I was wishing you would not ask because I don't know what it is. It looks like some amateurish later addition for what reason ever. Actually its position is too far at the rear for being the rest of a former hook. Seems like it is screwed to the barrel.
I just tend to ignore it. Nobody can explain for any possible later alteration on a 500 year-old item.

Anyway, I have added another close up.

Best,
Michael

[Matchlock]

A very similar socketed tiller arquebus is illustrated in a miniature in the illuminated Book of Hours (Stundenbuch) belonging to Mary of Burgundy, first wife of the later Emperor Maximilian I, ca. 1470 (portaits attached).

Please note that the arquebus is ignited by a piece of coal or tinder, and that several balls are shown leaving the muzzle.

Best,
Michael

[Matchlock]

Formerly in my collection. It is the finest Gothic arquebus ever recorded.

The barrel octagonal, in two stages and with bell-mouthed muzzle, no sights, the small right-hand side pan integrally cast, the originally swiveling cover missing. The breech struck with a founder's mark, a stag's head and antlers. Similar marks are known from contemporary cranequins.

The original brown limewood tiller stock is lavishly punched over its entire length with a lozenge pattern and Late-Gothic star- or flower-like designs, the way the were used to decorate contemporary book bindings.
A mid-15th c. caduceus (Heroldsstab) in the Historic Museum Dresden shows similar staging and zigzag decoration, and both a haquebut stock in the Bayerisches Armeemuseum Ingolstadt (inv.no. A210) and a small cannon (Tarrasbüchse) in the Burgmuseum Wels, Austria, are similarly punched (attachments).

A similar but plain socketed arquebus is preserved in the Polish National Museum Warsaw, the original tiller stock hollowed out to receive the ramrod (attached).

Best,
Michael

[Matchlock]

Some more book bindings with similar punched decoration.
m

[Matchlock]

A similar brass barrel, ca. 1490-1500, probably founded in a Nuremberg workshop, and in excavated condition, the breech struck with a Gothic minuscule s mark, fetched 8,000 euro including buyer's premium at Hermann Historica's yesterday.
It is mainly the short and pronounced octagonal muzzle section that accounts for the assigned date.

Here are the details.

m

[Matchlock]

More close-ups.

[Matchlock]

A supplement to post # 17:

The Warsaw tiller arquebus can also be closely dated to ca. 1500; one basic fact, though by far not the only one, is that the swiveling pan cover is fixed by a screw - the earliest known use of a screw on any firearm.
As I stated here earlier, screws - though well-known - are not recorded to have come into use on items involving mechanics before the end of the 15th c., such as the Maximilian tournament breast plates (Stechzeuge) of ca. 1490 and 1495 preserved in the Vienna Armory.
Their screw heads are of early, highly figured shape.

Interestingly enough, screw heads on finely made wheellocks still retained that Gothic shape up to the mid-16th c., as can be seen on a mechanism dated 1551, also in Vienna; author's photos.


Best,
Michael