Engraving Breakdown - Preview
To me one of the most fascinating aspects of owning and researching these 100 plus year old guns is interpreting or deciphering the decorative "personality" of the individual gun. A couple ways is to attach a "human" element to these guns, either through ownership identity, history and lore.... or, the personality or mindset of the engraver on the more adorned grades. Grade 2's almost have enough to capture a personality or theme, while it seems to me the grade 3's & 4's have the "just right" amount of decorative engraving to really capture a theme, identity or personality to the gun. Whatever you want to call this aspect, I find most compelling especially in the absence of any ownership history known about the gun. That is the case with my gun, with only Stock Book info and zero ownership history outside my family as described in my first post in Hammer Guns. The more adorned the guns get which tends to be largely excessive scroll, sometimes almost project an overly "busy" appearance.(to me) The high grades are awesome in there own right, especially when the bolsters are really "gooched" up and some of those with the blued barrels have sharp contrast appeal to me. But I find the creatively adorned mid-grades the most appealing. Just the right balance of "Adornment" and "Gun" to be unique and attractive to the sportsman-minded owner/collector.
So... all that being said, feel free to nibble and comment on this "smattering" of thoughts regarding the guns personality through engraving. I will follow up with a post depicting the major gun components with the engraving attributes numbered to discuss the significance and identity of each. I'll try to make this interesting and hope to attract the insight of anyone interested in commenting, it would be great to get a "Pro" Engraver (JJ & others?) to weigh-in on some of the finer aspects of the trade.
We'll see.....
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