Back in the 80’s, while cleaning out local American Legion Hall basement, they came across a closet with a bunch of old rifles that had basically fallen apart, and were going to throw them out...supposedly old war memorabilia. They offered one to Dad since he was a hobby gunsmith. He bought a stock blank mail order, and rebuilt the rifle...the barrel was good (.257 Roberts).
After he died, I inherited the rifle...and wish I’d asked more questions about it. I pulled it out of the gun safe the other day & got to wondering what exactly the back story was...so started looking around the internet.
The only visible markings are the left rear of barrel is stamped with “257 ROB”, and behind it on the receiver it’s stamped with some type of Arabic looking script.
By looking at
www.turkmauser.com, it appears it might be an old Model 1893 Mauser from the Ottoman Empire era.
The first 4 chars of the scripting are a year code, which translates into 1894.6 Gregorian calendar (1312 Islamic calendar).
There's also a crest on the top...Has markings of 1936, Ankara Military Factory...doesn't show T.C. though.
So I'm guessing it was originally built in 1894, but in 1936 was modified to 257 ROB. From what I've read, most of these were modified to 8mm, so wondering where/when 257 ROB came into play & why. Also wondering what exactly the arabic script on the receiver says.
If anyone can provide any additional info or backstory, I'd sure appreciate it. Thanks for the info...JR
Photo-Barrel/Receiver
Photo-Receiver closeup
Photo-Crest