Thomas Del Mar - Arms & Armour

272
A VERY RARE PAIR OF SAXON AIR PISTOLS BY FUTTER À
DRESSDE, CIRCA 1750
with tapering sighted barrels sheathed in brass and
moulded at the muzzles, broad brass breech tangs of
shaped outline engraved with flowers and foliage, signed
stepped ‘dummy’ flintlock mechanisms engraved with
scrolling foliage (defective), figured walnut full stocks
carved with a flowerhead about the breech tangs and with
raised mouldings about the mounts (the stocks with light
bruising), brass mounts comprising engraved two-piece
side-plates, short spurred pommels with screw-in caps
covering the valves, moulded trigger-guards with slender
baluster finials, and pair of ramrod-pipes, horn fore-end
caps, and each with its steel ramrod
44.5cm; 17I in
(2)
126
272
Inv. nos. F008 & F009.
Barrel reservoir pistols with mock flintlock mechanisms are
notably rare. Another pair are preserved in the
Schwarzburg (inv. nos 1211-12) and are signed C. G. Pflug
in Jena. See A. Hoff 1972, p. 40.
Johann Joseph Futter is recorded in Dresden working for
Johann Leopold Milotta in the second quarter of the 18th
Century. He became Hofbüchsenmacher in 1754, worked in
Warsaw 1759-63 and returned to Dresden in 1770. An air
rifle and a combined flintlock and air gun by this maker are
preserved in the former Saxon Electoral collections, inv.
nos. 1840 S.3 and 1799 S.513. See D. Schaal 1975, pp. 124-
129.
£5000-7000