Wow...some folks really really dislike German Relief engraving! (sort how I feel about Fox AE, BE, CE, XE and DE engraving. you know what I mean. Wretched, poorly executed, game scenes and/or poison oak leaves with crap game scened animal outlines and detailing...ocasionally accompanied by lightnen' bolt engravin' mistakes....sheesh! Talk about bad engraving...yikes!)
The "lion head" scene that some one refered to in an earlier post is actually "The spirit man of the forest" or "Green man" of the forest and is linked to pagenism. This sort of motif is not commonly seen on German made guns. (I've only have seen it on a few Sauer produced pieces). The Green Man/Spirit Man engraving motif as used on Sauer made pieces is usually shown as a humanoid type face surrounded by whiskers..as is in the case of this Sauer low wall. While some would say the engraving on the piece is truly bad, I would ask "compared to what" (See rant about Fox engraving above)
The rifle was a special ordered piece and likely commisioned by its purchaser to incorporate the directed motif and was executed as directed. Honestly the first time that I saw it I thought it was commisioned by a some one from the United States living in Germany/Berlin. To my eye the rifle has this aire of US patriotism (Eagles) that I have never seen on any German gun.
