A few years ago I purchased a handgonne from the Rifle Shoppe, and made a nice stock for it. It sat on the wall for the past 4 years and this weekend I finally took it out and shot it. It's about a .71 caliber and was really fun to shoot. BUT.....
The touchhole is small and along with the barrel I purchased a long, matchcord 'trigger' that is about 14 inches long. I had to put the gonne between two sandbags to steady it enough while I carefully touched off the priming powder with my smoldering matchcord that I had in the trigger. The trigger, by the way, is not attached to the gonne, yet. In my minimal researching I've never seen a handgonne with a long trigger mechanism before, but after trying to hold it, touch off the powder with the matchcord and aiming, I was perplexed as to how it was done if this mechanism wasn't attached to the stock. By attaching the trigger to the stock, will I take away the historical correctness of it, or do any of you out there have documentation of a matchcord 'trigger'.

You might get something from these links or you can e-mail them as this is their thing

http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Vault/1945/Guns/BP.htm


http://www.musketeer.ch/blackpowder/history.html

Just be cautious about what you read on websites. I recommend the same thing regarding websites as books. Look up the sources. If none are given ask and if none are given from them don't rely on it. I don't know either of the websites owners but I have never heard or seen evidence of hand gonnes in the early to mid 14th ever. In fact I have only found fleeting info for late 14th use of handgonnes usually interepreting what others to be a cannon as a hand gonne (which is possible but still hypothetical). I typically guess early cannons would not have been of the same size as mons meg but would be large enough not to be manuverable from weights given in some inventories.

I have seen the illustration of the earliest serpentine lock probably could be but you may want to try getting a look at the illustration first. It is worth a look. If it is then it would be very rare for some decades.

The majority of handgonnes in illustrations pre 1460-70 show a pipe on a stick like one. I assume most of Charles the Bolds handgonners were armed so as it took time for the more advanced gonnes also have with a more advanced trigger system but I assume this trigger makes its way onto the pipe ones as well.
Now there also is a number of sources that indicate two man teams as well. This may perhaps help somewhat as well. If you look at hussite ordinances they are always in two man groups.... there also are many illustrations that show the handgonnes being fired so. Not much help likely but the search is half the fun. David Nicolle and Kelly Devries have some info on this as well. This may be one of the difficulties experienced with early gonnes.

RPM

Here is a picture of it (1411 serpertine lock) and a new website for you.


http://homepages.tig.com.au/~dispater/north_1411.JPG

http://homepages.tig.com.au/~dispater/handgonnes.htm

Those early firearms he shows have been dated all the way from 1350-1420's (the one he has listed as early 1300's on his site in his own picture lists as 1350) so have caution with what you read (present company included :lol: )

:D :D :D

RPM