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Though a number of deluxe rifled sporting carbines from Versailles are
known today, only a very limited number of the more sophisticated
turnover carbines were manufactured. Most of the few known examples are
retained in institutional collections in Europe, including an example in the
State Historical Museum in Moscow and a very similar combination rifle and
smoothbore turnover gun in the Wallace Collection (Inv: A1126) identified
as made in 1805 and attributed as owned by Emperor Nicholas I of Russia.
That example is also featured in “French Pistols and Sporting Guns” by A. N.
Kennard on pages 50-51. It may have been presented originally to Emperor
Alexander I of Russia at the same time he received a pair of Boutet pistols
and a rifle from Napoleon after the signing of the Treaties of Tilsit in 1807
ending Napoleon’s war with Russia and Prussia and allying Imperial Russia
with Napoleon against the British Empire and Sweden.
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