found a K98 in France?

Hello all,
Some 45 years ago i pulled this out of the ground next to the road where we stopped to have a snack, i was a kid back than of 12 or so on vacation in France. I found it interesting so i took it with me back home to Holland and put it on the wall of my room. Recently i tried to fiend out what kind of gun it is and as far as i can see it is a K98, german rifle. I am not sure but i think it could be WW1, also because i found it in northern France where there was quite a battle going on. I made 2 pictures of it, on one there are some very hard to read text or numbers written, i could not figure out what. Could somne expert here tell me if it's a ww1 k98? thanks for replying in advance!
Klaas

Welcome to the forum, it’s Yugoslavian of some flavor. See this thread here:
http://www.k98kforum.com/showthread.php?37869-Yugo-M1924-Cavalry-Carbine

Amazing! Looks you are right from the pictures, now i am even more puzzeld how a Yugo gun gets into the ground in Nortern France... Could it be that the Wehrmacht used Yugo made K98 rifles during the war? I know they used foreing artillery extensivly but not sure about small arms.

Klaas said:

..Could it be that the Wehrmacht used Yugo made K98 rifles during the war?

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Sure did! There's a term for it. Beutewaffen and we have a sub-forum here for them and this rifle is in it. Well not THIS one. http://www.k98kforum.com/forumdispl...Rifles-and-Beutewaffen-used-from-1871-to-1945

Cool story too! I know 12 year old me would have been losing my mind.

Klaas said:

Amazing! Looks you are right from the pictures, now i am even more puzzeld how a Yugo gun gets into the ground in Nortern France... Could it be that the Wehrmacht used Yugo made K98 rifles during the war? I know they used foreing artillery extensivly but not sure about small arms.

Click to expand...

The Yugoslavs never made a "K98" rifle before or during the war. This would be a Yugoslav M1924 rifle action, which is based on the Belgian FN M1924 model rifle. Production of these ended in 1941 with the German invasion. These rifles were indeed captured from Yugoslavia and used by the Germans during the war. After WW2, the Yugoslavs did use and refurbish former German K98k rifles.

thanks everyone for the help in this matter, much appreciated! unfortunately this was probably my first and also last post on this forum, as you may know it is very difficult in the Netherlands to possess weapons due to very strict legislation. But if I dig up another rusty piece, than who knows ....