Indo-Persian 19th Century, need help IDing further.

[MrSaladMonday]

I have come into a piece from a local antique store that was listed as a '19th Century Indo-Persian Rifle'. Neither the store nor the sellers had knowledge beyond that, so I've been attempting to do some research into its exact origins, but this has proven difficult. Primarily, because its flared butt design doesn't match the conventional rigid stock seen in Indo-Persia in the 19th Century and I have found only one other weapon with the same appearance.

A further consideration is that the weapon appears to be smoothbore, yet possesses a percussion firing mechanism and I'm unable to tell due to aging if the mechanism is part of its original design, or a later upgrade. What I can confirm at least is that the iconography still visible etched on its metalwork matches Islamic Arabesque art of the period which does hint at Turkish origin.

Does anyone know of the origin of this piece, or perhaps knows of any sources that might be able to shed some light? I've been looking into this for a while now with no luck so far.

Any help at all would be greatly appreciated.

 

[cynthialee]

Looks like a miss match of parts to me. The lock and trigger guard just don't look right. I am not an expert by any stretch of the imagination however and my opinion is just that.

Wall hanger.

 

[hawkeye2]

You are surprised that a percussion gun could be a smoothbore? Is that a 3/16" gap between the breech of the barrel and the stock? It seems to have been built in its present configuration but the question is was it ever meant to be an actual functioning firearm.

 

[bpd303]

Hi and welcome to the forum. I can't help with the Id, but I bet ricky will be along shortly. He seems to know more about those guns than anyone I know. Very interesting guns though.

 

[blackpowderscout]

I've seen some that look similar to that in condition and build quality in bazaars in Afghanistan whose main customers were American troops.

I am not much of an antique gun evaluator though.

 

[rickystl]

Hi Mr. Salad. The long gun you have is from Sind (Sindh). Sind is a mountainous area between India and Pakistan. If you Google Sind you can read about it's history.
Your gun was likely made in the mid-late 19th Century. These long guns usually show up in either matchlock or percussion locks. Flintlocks are fairly rare with these guns. Which is unusual since most of the Middle/Near Indo-Persian East preferred the flintlock due to the cost and low availability of percussion caps. The lock on yours looks to be original to the gun. Note the hammer is either pinned/screwed from the inside of the lock. Barrels were both rifled and smooth bore. The unique curvature of the stock was designed to carry under the arm pit while riding on horseback or camel. Note the butt stock is wide - but thin. This also can cause a weak spot in the stock near the wrist section. The gap between the barrel and stock ?? Can you take a photo of that area and a photo of the muzzle end? Anyway, hope this helps.
Here are a couple photos of my Sind rifle. This is a bit more fancy with a .40 caliber rifled barrel in good shooting condition. Notice the same butt stock design as yours. Rick. :hatsoff:

 

[MrSaladMonday]

Extremely helpful fellas, really appreciate the responses, cannot stress that enough.

R.E Cynthialee - I do fully intend for it to be a wall hanger, yes. Sadly its not in the best state of preservation overall so I certainly wouldn't recommend otherwise

R.E. Hawkeye2 and Ricky - My surprise is mainly as I have a very limited understanding of when flintlocks began to be converted into - or replaced by - percussion mechanisms. Combined with the fact that until now the only other example of these I'd seen was flintlock, yet otherwise matched up almost entirely, left me wondering whether or not this piece was a natural percussion/smoothbore.

As for the split between the barrel and stock, the original batch of images didn't convey the state of the stock too well, so hopefully these should help. The gap between the barrel and stock is almost certainly due to the wood itself being in a state of ill repair. It looks to have been exposed to the elements a few times too many. Other signs include that the barrel and barrel bands have twisted slightly to the right (hopefully the relevant image shows this), and the ramrod is visible through an especially large crack in the underside.

On a further note, a friend of mine had made an educated guess that the weapon's shape was to make it easier to carry on camel/horseback, so I dare say he'll be pleased to hear he got that right.

EDIT: Seems the imgur links aren't quite linking into the post this time. I had this issue with other image hosting sites for the original post, so I'll at least make sure the URLs link correctly.

 

[rickystl]

Morning. Or I should say evening at your location. :haha: Glad we were able to identify your gun.
Often, these Sind made guns are mis-identified as Afghan made. To help with any confusion, below are pics of two different, but common Afghan made long guns. Both have curved butt stocks used for the same carry purpose. But the butt stocks differ from the Sind made guns. A lot of these Afghan made guns show up everywhere (including cheap ones made for the tourist market). But the Sind made guns only seem to show up on occasion.
Anyway, glad we could ID your gun. Hope you can post the additional photos. Rick. :hatsoff:

 

[MrSaladMonday]

Aye, it were my initial searches into identifying the piece that brought me mostly towards Afghan and Ottoman weapons of the period, which threw me off a bit. Still, excellent to have the mystery solved. My thanks again.

On another note, I'm having some mild difficulty correcting the images I linked in my first response. I've had some good assistance from one of the moderators, but the device holding the images and the hosting site itself are giving me a few niggling pains, so if the URLs fail to link to the images, please let me know and I'll have a go at replacing them outright.

 

[lee marrin]

Hi, your second set of photos should appear if you add a .JPG extension to them:

--I've left a couple of spaces in the example so it won't fully display, but here is the same link without spaces: