80. Auction

Afghan flintlock gun Jezail, walnut stock, mother-of-pearl inlays, brass bands, 19th century

Iron, walnut, brass and mother-of-pearl, Jezail, flintlock gun, Afghanistan, 19th century, calibre 17 mm. Very long round barrel with transverse grooves at the breech, walnut fore-end with mother-of-pearl inlays in rows between brass bands. Flintlock with rounded lock plate, cock with flint in leather pad, frizzen, frizzen spring and pan, shaped iron trigger guard, on the opposite side mother-of-pearl inlays in a brass frame. Strongly curved butt with mother-of-pearl platelets in rows between nailed brass-coloured strips, mother-of-pearl rosettes, brass-coloured decorative plate and round wooden end. Age-appropriate condition, the barrel slightly pitted with rust, mechanism functional. L. 176 cm

The Jezail is the long gun of Central Asia and British India, in the 19th century above all of the Pashtuns of Afghanistan. Its strongly curved butt was held against the shoulder or, when riding, close to the trigger; the stocks are richly decorated. With a range of about 400 yards, the Jezail carried further than the British Brown Bess with its 150 yards, which earned it its reputation in the First and Second Anglo-Afghan Wars and during the British retreat from Kabul in 1842. The rows of mother-of-pearl platelets and the rosettes on the butt belong to the decoration of the better-appointed pieces.