Lot Essay
Probably made to the order of Frdric Spitzer.
.jpg?w=1)
PARTLY EARLY 17TH CENTURY
Details
A 100-Bore French Wheel-Lock Holster Pistol
Partly early 17th Century
With slender tapering parcel-gilt barrel chiselled in high relief with a horned monster-head at the muzzle, and at the breech with a figure of Mars above grotesque beasts and surmounted by a putto, all in high relief, the intermediate section cut in low relief with strapwork, flowers and foliage enclosing oval medallions decorated with musical and martial trophies, long parcel-gilt tang extending to the pommel and decorated with a running design of flowers and foliage involving a satyr-mask and a cornucopia, slightly convex parcel-gilt lock chiselled in relief with foliated scrolls and grotesques, engraved wheel, engraved and chiselled pan-cover and cock, fruitwood full stock (old insets, fore-end tip cracked and probably later) inlaid with white staghorn lines carved with a running pattern of scales enclosing small staghorn panels carved in the form of serpents, arrows, and monster-heads, and a bearded male profile head on each side of the barrel tang, parcel-gilt trigger-guard and trigger-plate cut respectively with a mask and foliage, and a cornucopia, flowers, fruit and foliage, chiselled V-shaped side-plate, oval parcel-gilt iron pommel chiselled in high relief with a Roman general with a trophy arms at his feet, staghorn fore-end cap (probably later) carved with birds, and wooden ramrod with staghorn tip
27in. (69.8cm.)
Partly early 17th Century
With slender tapering parcel-gilt barrel chiselled in high relief with a horned monster-head at the muzzle, and at the breech with a figure of Mars above grotesque beasts and surmounted by a putto, all in high relief, the intermediate section cut in low relief with strapwork, flowers and foliage enclosing oval medallions decorated with musical and martial trophies, long parcel-gilt tang extending to the pommel and decorated with a running design of flowers and foliage involving a satyr-mask and a cornucopia, slightly convex parcel-gilt lock chiselled in relief with foliated scrolls and grotesques, engraved wheel, engraved and chiselled pan-cover and cock, fruitwood full stock (old insets, fore-end tip cracked and probably later) inlaid with white staghorn lines carved with a running pattern of scales enclosing small staghorn panels carved in the form of serpents, arrows, and monster-heads, and a bearded male profile head on each side of the barrel tang, parcel-gilt trigger-guard and trigger-plate cut respectively with a mask and foliage, and a cornucopia, flowers, fruit and foliage, chiselled V-shaped side-plate, oval parcel-gilt iron pommel chiselled in high relief with a Roman general with a trophy arms at his feet, staghorn fore-end cap (probably later) carved with birds, and wooden ramrod with staghorn tip
27in. (69.8cm.)
Provenance
Rothschild inv. no. AR2302.