ALMOST CERTAINLY FOR THE GENEVA ARSENAL

with swamped barrel formed in two stages, octagonal breech stamped with the barrelsmith’s mark (indistinct) and engraved with a band of ropework, flat lock retained by two side nails passing through the lock plate and engaging the belt-hook bracket, fitted with external wheel retained by a circular bracket, safety-catch, sliding pan-cover with button release and moulded dog, decorated throughout with pairs of lines en suite with the barrel, full stock profusely inlaid over its surface with engraved staghorn panels and scrolling leafy tendrils, including cherub masks on the fore-end, an exotic bird and a cherub opposite the lock and with the figure of Lucretia in a niche on the spine of the butt, compressed spherical pommel decorated with winged cherubic masks issuant with foliage between segmental lines and a warrior rondel on the pommel, steel trigger-guard and openwork belt hook, engraved ramrod-pipe and fore-end cap, and wooden ramrod with engraved staghorn tip (the stock with extensive restored worm damage, ramrod later), 57.5 cm overall

Provenance

Robert Brooker Collection inv.no. 1428

Part of a distinctive group of pistols formerly in the Geneva arsenal, all of which are inlaid in this manner and have female figures, including Lucretia and Saint Barbara, on the spines of the butts. Other examples, now preserved in the Musée d’art et Historie, Geneva, are illustrated Godoy 1993, pp. 306-312, nos. 172-178.