Very small matchlock, any ideas?

[estcrh]

Originally Posted by fernando

What a fascinating piece of information; can you tell where you got it from ?

Fernando, this information comes from the book titled "Tanegashima: The Arrival of Europe in Japan" By Olof G. Lidin, according to the books available on the subject, the lord of the Japanese island (Tanegashima) were the Portuguese first landed purchased two matchlock rifles from the Portuguese and put a swordsmith to work copying the matchlock barrel and firing mechanism. The smith (Yaita) did not have much of a problem with most of the gun but "drilling the barrel helically so that the screw (bisen bolt) could be tightly inserted" was a major problem as this "technique did apparently not exist in Japan until this time." The Portuguese fixed their ship and left the island and only in the next year when a Portuguese blacksmith was brought back to Japan was the problem solved.

Another interesting bit of information is that supposedly the original matchlocks supplied by the Portuguese to the Japanese were manufactured in Goa India which the Portuguese captured in 1510, and using the existing arms manufacturing industry that was already there they started making snap matchlocks based on a European design and yet the Indians themselves used a different variety (which I believe was based on the variety used by the Muslim world), this information comes from "The bewitched gun : the introduction of the firearm in the Far East by the Portuguese", by Rainer Daehnhardt, 1994.