Tercerol
The Terzerol (plural: Terzerole) is a small muzzle-loading pistol . There are single and double barrel versions. As the firing mechanism of the pocket pistol was used in the 17th century, a stone castle , which in the 19th century by the more reliable percussion lock was replaced.
The older tercerols, with screwable barrels, served as a rather inexpensive alternative to belt and saddle pistols before revolvers became popular. Because of its size, this weapon was called "pocket pistol" or "ladies pistol", in contrast to the large handguns that were common in the past . The name pocket pistol comes from the Italian by Terzuolo for hawk males , because the names of birds of prey such. B. falconetto were often transferred to guns.
The simplest and mostly more recent versions of percussion tercerols were usually used as alarm weapons for chasing birds out of orchards and vineyards or for driven hunts. So has z. For example, the term vineyard pistol has also been naturalized - but mainly for weapons of larger caliber.
Percussion tercerols were mainly produced in large numbers in Mehlis and Liège due to what appeared to be a constant high demand for a very long period from the mid-19th century to the late 1930s. The American muzzle-loader Deringer are of similar design.
Web links
- Terzerol, das. In: Adelung, Grammatical-Critical Dictionary of High German Dialect. Volume 4. Leipzig 1801, p. 558.
- Pistol (1). In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon. Volume 15. Leipzig 1908, pp. 912-914.