Product Details
AN EXCEEDINGLY RARE, POSSIBLY EXPERIMENTAL 20-BORE FLINTLOCK BREECH-LOADING CARBINE, UNSIGNED, serial no. 17,
almost certainly Viennese and circa 1655, with rifled tapering turn-off slightly swamped 30in. barrel operating on an interrupted thread with ball detent locking catch, brass fore-sight bead, standing leaf rear-sight (extra leaf replaced), sheet iron flash-guard covering half the barrel's circumference at breech, tapering cylindrical breech-section with corresponding applied sheet-iron guard as per barrel, the top grooved with a sighting channel extending onto the barrel and back along the top-tang, applied pan with faceted frizzen and concealed frizzen-spring, flat bevel-edged back-action lock with faceted stepped tail, the hammer retained with an internal bolt, later or replacement walnut 'roach-bellied' butt-stock, sheet brass butt-plate engraved 'No 17', applied iron trigger-guard, single set trigger (adjuster missing) with wing-nut safety behind, the underside of barrel with provision for sling (some cleaning and mild surface pitting to exposed iron surfaces)
Provenance: Ex Lot 313 Bonhams Fine Antique Arms and Armour from the Henk L. Visser Collection, Wednesday 28th November 2007
Literature: G. de Vries and B.J. Martens The Visser Collection vol. 1, part 4, cat. no. 926 pp.556-557,
Other Notes: Another similar carbine was sold by Sotheby & Co. London 23rd July 1974, Lot 62 and was formerly in the collection of W.G. Renwick. Signed 'Jonss (or Jouss) Goliar a Viene' it is dated 1657. J. Jouss Goliar, who was probably French or Swiss, made a further similar carbine, currently in the Bargello, Florence which was presented by Emperor Leopold I of Austria (to whom he was the appointed gunmaker) to Grand Duke Ferdinando II. A third example now in the Royal Armoury, Dresden was made by Michael Gull of Vienna, and the system was also used by Daniel Rene of Heidelberg and Heinrich Moritz of Kassel.
The carbine presented here is most probably unfinished and is 'in the white', suggesting that it may be the prototype for the above mentioned arms
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Estimate £3,600-3,800