Stutzen

[yamoon]

Are stutzen rifles all full stock or are half stock 20 inch barrel rifles also stutzen rifles.?
Thanks Mike

[Axel E]

This is what I published on the subject in Bulletin#35 of the German Gun Collectors Ass. www.germanguns.com some years ago:
Regarding the article on "Mannlicher" stocks, you stepped into one of the many traps of the complicated German language: Unfortunately there are three very similar verbs (two of them even spelled and spoken the same) with different meanings:
1.) st?tzen or stuetzen (the "Umlauts" ? and ? are only short forms of ue and oe) = to support, to prop up. This is the one you tried to use to explain "Stutzen".
2.) stutzen = to stop short, to hesitate: obviously wrong.
3.) stutzen = to trim, to cut back, to shorten: This is the one to use! Since the 1700s the southern Germans and Austrians used Stutzen for any rifle shorter than a long infantry musket. (the Swiss in their slightly different dialect say Stutzer instead)
For instance the Stutzen M1768 for Austrian Grenzscharfsch?tzen = frontier sharpshooters (the Austro-Hungarian "frontier" to the Ottoman empire was a broad military zone with a 300 year history of skirmishes, raids and guerilla warfare): You would possibly describe this as an "Jaeger"-type flintlock over-under, combination rifle.(one barrel rifled for accurate shooting, the other smooth for rapid reloading) Yes, it was military issue!
Another example:The military straight pull M95 Mannlicher came in three designations:
Gewehr M95: Long infantry rifle with 30" barrel
Karabiner M95: carbine for cavalry use with 20" barrel and sling attachment on the left side of the stock.
Stutzen M95: short rifle for special (mountain-, artilllery-) troops, 20" barrel, same length as carbine, but sling swivels on the bottom and a bayonet mount like the rifle.
So the Austrians were apt to call any rifle a Stutzen, even the 24" barreled, half stocked, 7x64 or 8x60 M1925 Mannlicher-Schoenauer were variously called the "Hochgeschwindigkeitsstutzen" or "Hochrasanzstutzen" in old catalogs. An old Springer, Vienna, catalog even used “Doppelstutzen” for the double rifles they offered
Note also the expressions "Feuerstutzen" for a Schuetzen-style target rifle and "Zimmerstutzen" for an indoor target rifle.
In Germany, except the part south of the Danube, neighboring Austria and Switzerland ,the use of the word Stutzen or Stutzer for a rifle was totally unknown until after 1900! Instead, short rifles were called Karabiner and full stocks were circumscribed as stocked to the muzzle in contemporary catalogs.
When Steyr started selling their Mannlicher-Schoenauer sporting rifles in 1905, the short barreled, full stock, double set trigger versions became the most popular in continental Europe. As the Steyr factory called all their rifles "Stutzen" in their catalogs, only then "Stutzen" became a German household word for a full stocked, short rifle! So, the expression "Stutzen" for a full stocked short rifle is hardly older than your "Mannlicher stock"! (Well,at least over here "Mannlicher" is still a protected trade mark of the Steyr factory, while Stutzen is not!)
Nowadays in most of Germany any full- stocked hunting rifle, even if it has a 24” barrel, is called a “Stutzen”, but short-barreled, half-stocked rifles may be called “Karabiner”, but never “Stutzen”.
Exception: In the southernmost part of Bavaria, bordering Austria, and in Austria any sporting rifle, regardless of stock and barrel length, may be called a Stutzen.

[yamoon]

Thanks Axel, enlightening explanation as always.
Mike