Raimey, what I find so very interesting about the gentleman who engraved these guns is apparently he cut it free handed. That is, I don't think he even laid out a design on the metal but had it in his mind and with total freedom proceeded to cut it. Probably something he had done for so many years it became easier to engrave on a blank sheet than to follow some layout or formal dictates. It's really refreshing to see an art work that is so relaxed yet each segment complimenting the other. The work of a genius.
Joe,
I'm curious as to how you can tell that the gun was engraved without transferring a pattern before the engraving began. There is no way that I can tell if he used a pattern or sketched the primary design on the gun before he started. It is true that if an engraver has executed the same design over and over on the same type of gun he or she can sometimes just start cutting with no layout but on a gun of this complexity I doubt that even a master (as this engraver undoubtedly was)would start cutting without scribing in the spirals and banners.
It appears to me that the whole gun was engraved by the same hand however one must keep in mind that in Suhl an engraver's training was rigidly controlled so that when working in a particular style or to a specific pattern, one engraver's work looked a lot like another. In the UK and the US it was common for several engravers to work on the parts of a particular gun at the same time. The gun in question, however doesn't look like that to me.
FWIW, the style of scrollwork on both guns is known to Suhl engravers as "grund Englisch." In Austria they refer to it as "Neuenglishe Arabesken." What, English speaking engravers call "English scroll" is known to Suhl engravers as "druck Englisch" and to Ferlach engravers as "altenglische arabesken."
Regards,
Roger
