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An early pistol by Nicolas-Noël Boutet
Price:
Circa 1795
Caliber:
Large smoothbore
Action/Type:
Flintlock
Hand:
Both/Ambi
Status:
FOR SALE
Date Added:
11/04/26
OZGUNSALES ADVISE BUYERS REQUEST FIREARMS OR GOODS BE TAKEN TO A LICENSED FIREARMS DEALER TO VERIFY BEFORE ANY PAYMENTS ARE MADE.
ALL FIREARMS MUST BE TRANSFERRED THROUGH A LICENSED FIREARMS DEALER
ALL FIREARMS MUST BE TRANSFERRED THROUGH A LICENSED FIREARMS DEALER
This is an early pocket pistol by Nicolas-Noël Boutet.
Although Boutet pocket pistols are notoriously difficult to date with precision, this example offers several persuasive indicators of early manufacture, likely around the turn of the nineteenth century.
* Scale: At 180 mm, it is approximately 25% larger than Boutet’s later pocket pistols.
* Absence of later refinements: It lacks the signature “concealed” features associated with his mature output—most notably a concealed safety and a concealed frizzen spring.
* Stock architecture and signature context: The stock design matches—though on a larger scale—another pistol in my collection signed “Boutet Arq ord Du Roi” (“Boutet, Ordinary Gunmaker to the King”). Boutet adopted this title in 1788, on his marriage to Léonie-Émilie Desante, daughter of the gunmaker to Louis XVI. He used it until 1800, when Napoleon granted him an 18-year concession to operate the manufactory at the Palace of Versailles, after which he signed his arms “Boutet Directeur Artiste.”
The pistol has a 44 mm turn-off barrel, lightly engraved at the muzzle and breech and numbered “2.”
The concealed drop-down trigger is engraved to match.
The screw heads are deeply and exquisitely cut, and the cock is similarly engraved, including Boutet’s characteristic dolphin motif.
The stock is the visual and tactile centrepiece. Executed in heavily figured walnut, it is sculpted with a carved tassel at the junction to the pistol and a leaf motif at the terminal curve. It is a piece that is difficult to appreciate fully in photographs; in hand, the quality of the walnut and the confidence of the carving are immediately apparent.
Provenance: Acquired from a German collection and imported into Australia approximately eight years ago.
Rarity and market appearance: Early, transitional Boutet pocket pistols of this calibre and character are seldom encountered in private hands, and rarer still to see offered publicly. Examples of this type can go years without appearing on the open market anywhere, let alone in Australia.
The price reflects the pistol’s early date, artistic quality, and extreme rarity in today’s market. While appropriately positioned, I will meet the market where justified for serious collectors who recognise its significance.
Although Boutet pocket pistols are notoriously difficult to date with precision, this example offers several persuasive indicators of early manufacture, likely around the turn of the nineteenth century.
* Scale: At 180 mm, it is approximately 25% larger than Boutet’s later pocket pistols.
* Absence of later refinements: It lacks the signature “concealed” features associated with his mature output—most notably a concealed safety and a concealed frizzen spring.
* Stock architecture and signature context: The stock design matches—though on a larger scale—another pistol in my collection signed “Boutet Arq ord Du Roi” (“Boutet, Ordinary Gunmaker to the King”). Boutet adopted this title in 1788, on his marriage to Léonie-Émilie Desante, daughter of the gunmaker to Louis XVI. He used it until 1800, when Napoleon granted him an 18-year concession to operate the manufactory at the Palace of Versailles, after which he signed his arms “Boutet Directeur Artiste.”
The pistol has a 44 mm turn-off barrel, lightly engraved at the muzzle and breech and numbered “2.”
The concealed drop-down trigger is engraved to match.
The screw heads are deeply and exquisitely cut, and the cock is similarly engraved, including Boutet’s characteristic dolphin motif.
The stock is the visual and tactile centrepiece. Executed in heavily figured walnut, it is sculpted with a carved tassel at the junction to the pistol and a leaf motif at the terminal curve. It is a piece that is difficult to appreciate fully in photographs; in hand, the quality of the walnut and the confidence of the carving are immediately apparent.
Provenance: Acquired from a German collection and imported into Australia approximately eight years ago.
Rarity and market appearance: Early, transitional Boutet pocket pistols of this calibre and character are seldom encountered in private hands, and rarer still to see offered publicly. Examples of this type can go years without appearing on the open market anywhere, let alone in Australia.
The price reflects the pistol’s early date, artistic quality, and extreme rarity in today’s market. While appropriately positioned, I will meet the market where justified for serious collectors who recognise its significance.
+61499088152
Western Australia
D/L#: 1659172
We are primarily collectors of high-art or unusual firearms. Our firearms are expensive but that is because most of our guns are unique in their own way. I seek out the best of the best for my collection and pay whatever I have to pay to get them to Australia. I love every gun in my collection but financial reality dictates that if I am to continue to acquire new guns, something has to go.
I get as much enjoyment finding that special gun or guns and then researching their provenance as I do out of owning them.
I have a very extensive library of research material, some of my books are extremely rare and valuable, I have some of the rarest and most comprehensive books ever printed. MANUFACTURE D'ARMES DE VERSAILLES et NICOLAS BOUTET will set you back a couple of grand if you can find it but it is the best source available on obscure facts regarding the guns of Nicolas-Noel Boutet. The two volumes of LE QUI EST QUI DE L'ARME EN France provide another very valuable source of information on European guns. I also have the three volume set of Der New Stockel by Eugene Heer, which is probably the most comprehensive work on gunmakers ever published.
They are hard going because I don't speak French or German but the reward for effort with regard to finding out who made a particular gun makes the effort worthwhile.
It is very rewarding to hold a gun in your hand and then find a picture and description of it in a sixty-year-old book, particularly after international experts have been unable to determine provenance.
I get as much enjoyment finding that special gun or guns and then researching their provenance as I do out of owning them.
I have a very extensive library of research material, some of my books are extremely rare and valuable, I have some of the rarest and most comprehensive books ever printed. MANUFACTURE D'ARMES DE VERSAILLES et NICOLAS BOUTET will set you back a couple of grand if you can find it but it is the best source available on obscure facts regarding the guns of Nicolas-Noel Boutet. The two volumes of LE QUI EST QUI DE L'ARME EN France provide another very valuable source of information on European guns. I also have the three volume set of Der New Stockel by Eugene Heer, which is probably the most comprehensive work on gunmakers ever published.
They are hard going because I don't speak French or German but the reward for effort with regard to finding out who made a particular gun makes the effort worthwhile.
It is very rewarding to hold a gun in your hand and then find a picture and description of it in a sixty-year-old book, particularly after international experts have been unable to determine provenance.
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It is advisable that if you plan on purchasing from a Dealer who has listed an ad on this website to retain the information of the ad and the Dealers details for future reference, as we cannot guarantee that it will still be available if removed
It is advisable that if you plan on purchasing from a Dealer who has listed an ad on this website to retain the information of the ad and the Dealers details for future reference, as we cannot guarantee that it will still be available if removed