The INVESTinART Collection · Historical weapon · length 128 cm (128 × 6 × 8.5 cm)
Spanish Hunting Arquebus
documented 1761–1793 Madrid
About the work
A Spanish hunting arquebus with a Madrid-pattern miquelet lock from the workshop of royal arquebusier Salvador de Zenarro, made in Madrid between 1761 and 1793 — the work of a master who served King Charles III of Spain directly. The 128 cm long weapon is signed in three places, with gold-plated marks; the two-stage forged iron barrel bears three gold-plated stamps and a countermark, the engraved and silvered lock carries foliate decoration, the Spanish-style carved stock is restrained, and the ramrod is finished with a carved ivory pommel. An 18th-century weapon with certificate and expert documentation, uniting noble materials — iron, gold, ivory, wood — with a direct link to the Spanish royal court.
Catalogue details
- Artist
- Salvador de Zenarro
- Year
- 1761 – 1793
- Medium
- wood, steel, gold, ivory — forged, carved, chiselled, engraved
- Signature
- signed “Salvador D Zenarro” — on the lock, barrel breech and trigger guard, marks plated in gold
- Dimensions
- length 128 cm (128 × 6 × 8.5 cm)
- Provenance
- Auction house, Slovak Republic
About the artist
Salvador de Zenarro
documented 1761–1793 Madrid
Royal gunmaker to the Spanish court and one of the great names of the eighteenth-century Madrid school: a native of Basque Barrinaga, trained in Madrid under Joaquín de Celaya, he was named honorary royal gunmaker by Charles III in 1761 and full royal gunmaker a year later. The king prized his art so highly that he asked Zenarro, together with Miguel de Cegarra, to build an arquebus in his presence and before the royal princes.
He trained four successors and signed his weapons on the lock, breech and trigger guard; he died on 31 July 1793, and his marking tools had to be returned by his widow to the Real Armería in the Royal Palace of Madrid, where the works of the Madrid masters are kept to this day. Our hunting arquebus with its miquelet lock is a rare document of this court tradition.
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“Spanish Hunting Arquebus” — Salvador de Zenarro