A short balkan musket

[Philip]

Here is an example of a matchlock dated 1844 with a Spanish inscription on the lockplate, from a remote area in one of the Spain's former colonies in the Americas. What is notable, besides the long-obsolete mechanical design, is the shape of the buttstock, characteristic of parts of southern Europe two centuries or more earlier, totally unaffected by subsequent stylistic developments. The barrel of iron with flaring brass muzzle, cal. .62 in., overall length 41.5 in.

(Royal Scottish Museum, Edinburgh, inv. no. 1894.133)