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I just bought a Mitchell's Mauser on Gunbroker. It has a mark that I am not familiar with. Could someone tell me what it is? It looks like an X with a vertical line throught the middle.
Three lines, 6 points.

I got a good deal on it and took it. i have seen Russian marks before. They are deep and crude. These marks are uniform almost as thought done with a stamp. I will try to post a pic.

I'm not 100% sure, but I *think* that may be a reject stamp (the "tramp stamp" as I've seen it called). These were put on weapons that, for whatever reason, did not make it past the inspection process the first time due to one thing or the other being out of tolerance. They were then sent back through the factory and the problems corrected, and sent out. But then again, I could be wrong. Where on the rifle is the stamp located?

It's right above the serial # on the left side of the receiver. The rifle is all matching. As you can see in the pic there is some pitting, but very mild.

PvtJoker wrote:I'm not 100% sure, but I *think* that may be a reject stamp (the "tramp stamp" as I've seen it called). These were put on weapons that, for whatever reason, did not make it past the inspection process the first time due to one thing or the other being out of tolerance. They were then sent back through the factory and the problems corrected, and sent out. But then again, I could be wrong. Where on the rifle is the stamp located?

This is not an "unaccepted" stamp. It has six tines and is larger. The reject stamp is five tines and small. Weapons with parts and reworked twice and passed were send into service. If they did not pass the third an final inspection, they were scrapped. The very latest war rifles sometimes have parts with reject marks on them, since toward the end of the war, the need for working rifles outweighed the inspection standards for some parts. Since this rifle is early (1941), it is less likely that a receiver with a reject mark would have made it to testing and issue. It is more likely that this mark was made postwar by whatever institution inherited this rifle from the Germans.

I found this on a Gunbroker auction. It too is a Mitchill's Mauser Collectors.

A fellow collector on Gunboards.com said that the "snowflake" is rather common on Mitchell's Mausers (attractive looking noob suckering JUNK k98's). It's just another line added to the Russian Capture "X". Here's another Mitchell's example from GB:
Speaking of Boinked k98's, here's a Mitchell's Mauser trying to pass itself off as a rare elite auction piece for $1400.00! UnFriggin' believeable! Check out the Steyr single rune added to a Mauser factory made rifle!

http://merzantique.com/item.php?id=3548_0_2_0

My god, is nothing sacred. You think they would have at least used an actual BNZ K98 instead of a BYF to put the fake rune on. Idiots