Blogspot Antique Rifles posting today- check it out

[rich pierce]

http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com/2011/12/antique-rifles.html
The top 3 guns look like Euro muskets to me, there's a Germanic jaeger in there.  It's the 5th gun down that interests me the most.  Has a lock with a dog-catch on the cock, a sliding wooden patchbox, an octagon to round barrel, a fowling piece style guard, and big old buttpiece screws reminiscent of mid-1700's Dutch muskets.  Wish I knew if it is rifled and what wood it's stocked in.  heck of an early piece.  Patchbox lid is probably a period, in use replacement.  I wonder whether the gun is a restock or not and wish I could see the sideplate.

[Tom Currie]

How in the world #5  survived with what appears to be an original box lid is remarkable. That gun looks well travelled.

I like them all.

[Jim Kibler]

http://contemporarymakers.blogspot.com/2011/12/antique-rifles.html
The top 3 guns look like Euro muskets to me, there's a Germanic jaeger in there.  It's the 5th gun down that interests me the most.  Has a lock with a dog-catch on the cock, a sliding wooden patchbox, an octagon to round barrel, a fowling piece style guard, and big old buttpiece screws reminiscent of mid-1700's Dutch muskets.  Wish I knew if it is rifled and what wood it's stocked in.  heck of an early piece.  Patchbox lid is probably a period, in use replacement.  I wonder whether the gun is a restock or not and wish I could see the sideplate.

It appears to me to quite possibly be a restock or a gun with re-used parts.  The barrel is keyed to the stock.  I'm not certain when this first appeared, likely in academic work, but would guess the second quarter of the 18th century.  The guard is also likely no earlier than this period.  The lock seems likely to be 17th century.  It appears it is stocked in a light colored wood.  Definetly not walnut.  This of course doesn't help with where it might have been made.  I would bet it's unrifled given the barrel pattern.  I don't know, but it does seem there is a mix of time periods in the gun.

[Dan'l 1946]

  Could it be a European military piece? Some countries retained the dog catch quite late--long after it was out of fashion.
                               Dan
 P.S.
 Happy New Year to all!

[Jim Kibler]

Might be.  I don't know much about military and lower grade stuff. 

[rich pierce]

It looks like a parts gun to me as well.  The buttplate is probably from a Dutch musket, the lock is older than the furniture as noted.  I could not tell if it was stocked in beech, birch, maple, etc.  Probably not beech as I don't see the rays one often sees.  Interesting to me that it has a patchbox, though it would be surprising if the barrel was rifled.

[rich pierce]

I learned these pictures were from a Swedish auction house.  So the guns probably never made it to America, but similar guns may have been used in the colonies of course.