Expo number 415

 

Lock

With flat partially rounded surfaces, ring-necked cock and tongue-shaped frizzle, the plate engraved with a flower on the tail and, in front of the cock, with a landscape involving a church.

 

Barrel

With octagonal breech becoming circular after a step and with a wide moulded muzzle-ring in brass.

 

Stock

Carved in relief with scrolls in places and with a cheekpiece on the butt.

 

Mounts

Brass, originally gilt, comprising: one cylindrical ramrod-pipe (not at the entry); relatively large solid trigger-guard forking at the front and with a square elevation underneath the bow inscribed Peter / fromen / A:1659, solid triangular sideplate; and flat butt-plate with wide short tang squared off at the front; brass-tipped ramrod.

 

Remarks

(MAKER) The only traces of this gunmaker are in the parochial archives of the Saint John's church in Maastricht, i.e. according to Gulikers,' who reports finding that Peter Froomen, son of Jan Froomen, was born in 1638. Gulikers also mentions, as do Kist et al. and Heer/ Støckel, that Froomen died in Stockholm in 1685 and that he was in Maastricht in 1681 (1). However, none of these authors produces corroborative evidence for their information. In any case, not a trace of Froomen was found by Hanssen in the notarial archives of Maastricht.

(STYLE) Van der Sloot correctly remarks that the lock, the barrel and the trigger-guard may actually date from 1659, but that the stock and its mounts are later, probably early 18th C.

(DECORATIONS) The flattish carving on the butt is typical of that on many 18th-C firearms from German states.

(OBSERVATIONS) At first sight, this gun looks like a miniature musketoon because of its relatively heavy barrel. The latter, however, is clearly oversized for this miniature and its appearance suggests that, rather than acting as a miniature musketoon barrel, it may actually have been intended to use (for pleasure, as a technical toy), a suggestion reinforced by the equally oversized trigger-guard.

 

Literature

-Van der Sloot (1978) No. 127

-Kist et al. (1974) p. 170

-Heer/Støckel (Vol.1,1978) p. 404

 

Exhibited at

Stedelijk Museum `De Lakenhal', Leiden, July-Sept. 1978

 

1          Report on Maastricht Gunmakers by J.H.J. Gulikers, made on the basis of research carried out between Dec. 1984 and March 1985. Typescript in the possession of Mr Visser.