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Lot Essay
A handwritten note in one patch-box reads: 'This rifle is dead accurate at 50 yards using one dram of powder (no. 4 grain) & a ball wrapped in two of the linen patches.
W. Keith Neal 17/3/1956'
Georg Keiser was probably the most distinguished of the Vienna court gunmakers, as well as working to the greatest age. He was born in Eger, the son of an Eger gunmaker, Hans Keiser, in 1647, and was still working 93 years later as a gunmaker in Vienna. He began his apprenticeship before 1671 and was master in 1674. In later life he took to recording his age on the firearms he made - a pistol sold in these Rooms on 20 September 1989, lot 174 is signed 'Georg Keiser In Wienn Alt 90 Jahr'
Early examples of his work are very rare, and quite different to his products of the 1720s to 1740s in the typical Viennese manner. For further information on this maker see Hans Schedelmann, Die Wiener Büchsenmacher und Büchsenschäfter, p. 11, plates 12, 13, 64 and 65, and Die Großen Büchsenmacher, pp. 189-190: J.F. Hayward, The Art of the Gunmaker, vol. II, p. 120, plate 35(b)
W. Keith Neal 17/3/1956'
Georg Keiser was probably the most distinguished of the Vienna court gunmakers, as well as working to the greatest age. He was born in Eger, the son of an Eger gunmaker, Hans Keiser, in 1647, and was still working 93 years later as a gunmaker in Vienna. He began his apprenticeship before 1671 and was master in 1674. In later life he took to recording his age on the firearms he made - a pistol sold in these Rooms on 20 September 1989, lot 174 is signed 'Georg Keiser In Wienn Alt 90 Jahr'
Early examples of his work are very rare, and quite different to his products of the 1720s to 1740s in the typical Viennese manner. For further information on this maker see Hans Schedelmann, Die Wiener Büchsenmacher und Büchsenschäfter, p. 11, plates 12, 13, 64 and 65, and Die Großen Büchsenmacher, pp. 189-190: J.F. Hayward, The Art of the Gunmaker, vol. II, p. 120, plate 35(b)