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LOL. Yes. Apparently, we had "geeks" even back in the period. And many things I thought were older, were newer. And newer things actually older.I had a Hanoverian horse pistol from 1843 that had a cross bolt safety built through the tang of the hooked breech that would stick out on the lock to prevent the hammer from falling.
The in line striker for flint locks was built around 1700 and the in-line striker for a percussion system was patented about 1828. It was altered and became the Dreyse Needle gun.
Cartridges first existed, according to Greener in the 1300's in the form of what are called Thunder cups for breech loading artillery.- In the evolution of firearms, there is rarely anything completely new. Normally innovation is an adaptation of an older idea.. The fellow that built the revolving matchlock about 1580 got the idea somewhere, and improved on it. There were matchlock cartridge guns, flintlock cartridge guns and percussion cartridge guns., all breechloaders. Was there a swivel breech before that.? Was there a matchlock pepperbox before that? Remember the bizarre oddities that never caught on, like harmonica guns. How about this strange one:
View attachment 192236
Rick