A Myth: Early 16th C. European Matchlock 'Pistols'

[Matchlock]

We actually have records of two highly unusually construed fishtail-butted multi-barrel 'organ' pistols: the first ca. 1600, eight-barreled, and ignited by a wheellock mechanism that lit a slow-smoldering piece matchcord in a tubular conduit along the touch holes to ignite the other barrels in turn, and the other once dated 1607 (a former small bone plaque with that date now missing from the stock!!!), on the Roman candle principle, with no mechanism at all but ignited by a hand-held length of matchcord, is preserved at the Hugarian National Museum in Budapest. A third one, ca. 1650, featuring a wheellock mechanism and also built on that Roman candle superimposed-load system, was sold from the Hohenzollern museum collection at Schloss Signmaringen, and is now preserved at the Military Museum Rastatt, Baden, Germany.

The first was sold at Christie's London, from the Schloss Dyck museum sale part I, on April 15, 1992, lot 546, where a German dealer bought it for his private collection.


Best,
Michael