A fine and important French wheel-lock gun with a petronel stock richly inlaid with bone and a large lock carved with a horned devil holding two flowers. Two dolphins with brass eyes hold the exposed wheel and the lock is decorated with small brass studs along the rim. The primary motifs on the stock are grotesques, foliate stripes and putties. The butt stock is inlaid on the right side with a satyr and a pair of putties dragging a two-wheel carriage and another blowing a horn. On the right side is a rider with drawn sword attacking a lion and two males with clubs defending the 3 lilies of France under a crown. The 4-stage smoothbore barrel deeply marked with a herringbone mark is c. 130 cm. long and fluted at the end and at the front. The back sight is a c. 5.5 cm. long tube and the fore sight is a brass bead. The wooden ramrod inlaid with strips of bone is held by 3 bone ramrod pipes decorated with grotesque masks. The fore stock is decorated with putties riding dolphins and dense flower buds. The inlays are of the finest quality and the 3 lilies indicate that the original owner of the gun should be found in the French court.
With the gun is a two-part wheel lock spanner decorated with a lily and a piece of decorated parchment found beneath the barrel.
The iron rust marked.
Not sold. Inquiry