Seeking info on this rifle maker

[Larry Braun]

This rifle is a O/U swivel barrel rifle, about .58 Cal. The maker is inlaid in gold on the barrels and engraved on the side locks, "Keidusch/Weyerburg". I can't find any reference to either the maker or the location by those spellings. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks, Larry

[Larry Braun]

More photos

[C. Roger Bleile]

First, let me say that you have a fabulous antique rifle in splendid condition! I looked for Keidusch in Herr der neue Støckel (lists all gunmakers from the beginning to 1900) and I was surprised that there was no entry for that name. I also can't find a Weyerburg in Austria, Germany, or Poland. There are entries for Weyersburg however.

There are others who visit this forum who are far more knowledgable of these things than I so one of them may shed light on this mystery. I have found that in collecting and studying Germanic sporting guns it is one mystery after another. This is due to records destroyed by the many wars, names of towns changed, villages that cease to exist since WWI or WWII and so on. There also seems to have been an inumerable number of cottage industry gunmakers who only lasted one generation and only made a few guns under their own name.

Regards,
Roger

[Michael Petrov]

It's not a very big place now, not sure how big it was when your rifle was made.

http://www.google.com/search?q=Weyer...w=1600&bih=756

A fine rifle for sure I hope you can lean more about the maker.

[Larry Braun]

Thanks to some info from the Double Gun web site I found the town, just north of vienna. A very small village that has a castle, Schloss Weyerburg, belonging to the Schoenborn family so they had money there. Nothing on Keidusch. Thanks Larry