Antique Tintype Photograph of Hunting Party with Rifles and Rabbits

Here we have a tintype of four young men fresh off a hunt, or dressed and posed to look like it. Two guns stand muzzle up in their hands, and what reads like a brace of rabbits, plus one shape on the far left that looks more like a game bird. One man plants a boot square on top of a wooden barrel at their feet, more studio footstool at that point than hunting gear. Nobody's smiling exactly, but nobody looks unhappy about the morning's work either. This is occupational photography at its wildest. 

Whether these four actually spent the morning in a field or borrowed a photographer's rabbits for ten minutes isn't something we can settle from here, and it doesn't change how good the photograph is either way. The dark sack coats, slouch and bowler hats, and high collars put this somewhere in the 1870s through 1890s window. We're reading that off costume, not a date stamp, so treat it as an estimate.

No names on the verso, no location, no photographer's mark we could find. The plain, unpolished cut of their coats leans working class rather than gentleman sportsman.

The antique vice tintype comes out of an old estate in Iowa. 

The tintype measures 3 1/2” x 2 1/2”. The image detail holds up well once you get in close, four faces, two gun barrels, and at least two rabbits all read clearly, though overall contrast runs a touch darker and flatter than a crisper example would. The verso shows more pronounced edge and corner loss than typical wear, black corrosion creeping in from the borders, plus a small round mark near the upper left we can't identify. Surface has scattered handling scratches throughout. It currently lives in a protective plastic sleeve rather than a period case. Please see all pics as they are part of the description.

I ship FedEx to street addresses in the continental USA only (no PO Boxes). Free shipping of the wild old tintype. 

These dogs will hunt!