Original Item: The Central Powers of Austria-Hungary used, manufactured and commissioned, variations of the World War One German Stahlhelm M16 design. The Austrian M1917 helmet was similar to the German M1916, but had a few variations including the chinstrap, chinstrap rivets located higher up on the steel shell and variations in locations of markings among others.
In an amazing victory for the collecting community IMA secured an exclusive deal to purchase a major cache of totally original Austrian-Hungarian World War One helmets that were us by the Central Powers from 1916 through 1918. After the war these helmets were sold to the Finnish Army and used by the Finns through WW2 the Winter War, the Continuation War until the 1960s when they were taken out of service and put into military storage. Forty years later, in the early 2000s, all of these genuine German WW1 helmets were purchased by a Finnish dealer who, in 2014, sold them all exclusively to IMA. Therefore, the provenance of these amazing nearly 100 year-old, helmets cannot be disputed.
Early Austrian helmets were supplied by Germany, the first shells supplied as the chinstrap rivets were mounted in a lower position. The Austrians fitted their own chinstrap bales, chinstraps and liner and painted them in Austrian “Isonzo braun.” These modifications were carried out with German machinery at…
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