A RARE 8 BORE ITALIAN FLINTLOCK MUSKET, CIRCA 1650-60 shortened in its early life to carbine length, with tapering barrel formed in two stages and fluted over the breech, flat lock retained by two side nails, fitted with slender moulded cock, later top-jaw retained by an acorn-shaped screw, external main-spring and steel spring with filed mouldings, moulded full stock, carved with chevron mouldings over the fore-end (the forward portion restored), curved butt with rounded spine, iron mounts comprising a pair of small side nail washers, trigger-guard with shaped finial, butt bound with a moulded iron band and a single ramrod-pipe and associated iron-tipped wooden ramrod 65.0 cm; 25 5/8 in barrel Provenance William Goodwin Renwick, sold Sotheby & Co. 19 March 1973, lot 9 The above catalogue states that the only other recorded types of this flintlock were preserved in the Cabinet d'Armes of Louis XIII. A very similar example mounted on a French stock (Cabinet d'Armes no. 139) is preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum. See Hayward 1969, nos. 40 and 41.