ANOTHER, the barrel dated 1657, signed rounded lock (comb incomplete, steel-spring cracked) finely engraved with scrolling foliage, the tail, cock and steel chiselled en suite, walnut full stock, the fore-end partially carved with scrollwork, the cheek-piece inlaid with staghorn scrollwork and mother-of-pearl panels, some stained green, framing a large shaped panel involving grotesque monsters and masks, staghorn patch-box cover engraved with a monster, iron mounts including pierced scrolled side-plate terminating in a grotesque head, vacant escutcheon framed in pierced scrollwork, set trigger, engraved horn fore-end cap, and later wooden ramrod, the lock by Matthias Weins In Collen, late 17th Century | Christie's

Lot 71

ANOTHER, the barrel dated 1657, signed rounded lock (comb incomplete, steel-spring cracked) finely engraved with scrolling foliage, the tail, cock and steel chiselled en suite, walnut full stock, the fore-end partially carved with scrollwork, the cheek-piece inlaid with staghorn scrollwork and mother-of-pearl panels, some stained green, framing a large shaped panel involving grotesque monsters and masks, staghorn patch-box cover engraved with a monster, iron mounts including pierced scrolled side-plate terminating in a grotesque head, vacant escutcheon framed in pierced scrollwork, set trigger, engraved horn fore-end cap, and later wooden ramrod, the lock by Matthias Weins In Collen, late 17th Century

Details

ANOTHER, the barrel dated 1657, signed rounded lock (comb incomplete, steel-spring cracked) finely engraved with scrolling foliage, the tail, cock and steel chiselled en suite, walnut full stock, the fore-end partially carved with scrollwork, the cheek-piece inlaid with staghorn scrollwork and mother-of-pearl panels, some stained green, framing a large shaped panel involving grotesque monsters and masks, staghorn patch-box cover engraved with a monster, iron mounts including pierced scrolled side-plate terminating in a grotesque head, vacant escutcheon framed in pierced scrollwork, set trigger, engraved horn fore-end cap, and later wooden ramrod, the lock by Matthias Weins In Collen, late 17th Century
30½in. barrel [E.299, S.25]

Literature

A. Hoff,'Die Waffensammlung in Schloß Dyck', pp.133-4

Lot Essay

Matthias Weins is recorded in Cologne circa 1686 to his death before 1743, in the Untere Sporengasse, Cologne. Almost his entire surviving oeuvre is in the Schloß Dyck armoury. As half the barrels on his firearms are by other makers, it has been suggested that he did not make barrels. His signature invariably appears on the lock-plate

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