Firearms from the Collections of the Prince of Liechtenstein by Stuart W. Pyhrr

Though the Liechtenstein armory contains fewer examples of richly decorated arms than are found in the great dynastic collections in Vienna, Munich, Dresden, Copenhagen, and Stockholm-all now state-owned public museums-it presents a more accurate picture of the firearms collections assembled by the high nobility in Central Europe in the age of the Baroque. The international character of the collection can be accounted for, on one hand, by an active trade in firearms and, on the other hand, by the existence of the princes' interest in weapons of different origins and mechanical types. There is also a small group of oriental guns that are probably booty from the Austro-Turkish wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. More than three hundred firearms by Viennese makers are still present in the collection, as is an important group of arms made by the otherwise little-known gunmakers active in Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia. The firearms collection is one of the largest extant, comprising more than one thousand examples ranging in date from the sixteenth through the nineteenth century and coming from every corner of Europe: France, the Netherlands, Spain, England, Denmark, Italy, and the territories of Central Europe that constituted the Holy Roman Empire. The armory comprises plate armor and edged weapons, firearms and artillery, but it is the hand firearms (guns and pistols) that are of greatest historical and artistic interest. Thank you for all of your support in the past, it has meant more to me than you will ever know.The princely collection of Liechtenstein includes one of the last great armories in Central Europe to survive in the possession of the original family. As you can imagine, this is very upsetting for me, I have enjoyed working on the site to make it what it is, and it is devastating to at the very least tear a portion of it down. I am considering my options and at my age whether I can or should continue with the web site, or put it in the hands of someone else. After putting seven years into building up the site, I must either shut it down all together or purge it of any images that could be a liability. Now the photographer of that image has what is basically a collection agency coming after me to get money for past unathorized use. I did not know at the time, and until recently that a photographer of an image such as that has Copyright protection which goes above Merkel's authority.

I found an image in the 2007-2008 Merkel catalog which I wanted to use so I asked for and received permission from Merkel to use it.

Part of that was rebuilding the home page. In 2016 when I took it over from Dietrich, I began rebuilding it on a differant forematt. Recently a situation has developed which causes me to temporarily shut down or pause the web site.

Firearms from the Collections of the Prince of Liechtenstein by Stuart W. Pyhrr