Hi,
This is a great discussion. As a fairly skilled and historically astute gun maker, I don't find carving in styles found on most colonial and Rev War period firearms in America to be terribly difficult or time consuming to do. For example, I did a Reading gun on which I spent no more than 1.5-2 hours drawing, cutting and finishing the carving behind the cheek piece, and I suspect I was slow compared to my counterpart 250 years ago. Silver and brass wire inlay of the time on American guns is even easier and faster to do (note I specify "American" guns because metal wire inlay on many European and British guns can be very challenging). That is why I enjoyed my foray into the Edward Marshall rifle because it was almost certainly carved by a European trained master and as such stands out from many of its American contemporaries and is more challenging. It also was heavily used based on the wear so sophisticated decoration does not mean wall hanger in the 18th century. Moreover, one of the most time consuming aspects of decorating is designing, particularly for gun makers who are tradesmen and not trained artists or designers. Once you develop and cut a design, it is much quicker to repeat that over and over again, which is what we see on so many 18th century guns and which is often used as a signature for specific gunsmiths. In an era, in which so many utilitarian items had some decoration (e.g., Albrecht's coffee mill) it should not be surprising that so many surviving guns have some carving or decoration despite evidence of hard use and wear. Think of how many highly decorated American long rifles were converted to percussion. Why do that if it was not used? I think the idea of choice is a bit of a red herring. Obviously, a consumer has to select based on what is available but that availability is so site and time dependent, subject to so many contingencies, such that I doubt it is a very useful generalizing principle. Caspar Wistar was importing guns and parts from Germany during the early 18th century to meet a local market, Oerter made at least a few rifles for folks living quite far away, Dan Morgan traveled from Winchester, VA to Reading, PA to purchase rifles, apparently William Turvey and his successor, Jonathan Stanton, had quite a market selling to well heeled Maryland and Virginia land owners who were not impressed by the local rifled products, and of course Richard Wilson sold guns all over the colonies. Whether or not, buyers appreciated decoration must depend on personal traits of the buyer, and site and time specific contingency.
dave
