Antique Afghan firearms

I was talking to a local resident and the talk turned to firearms. She said that she had a collection of old guns and was wondering if I knew anything about them. She sent me the following pic. Some of them are Afghan, some are from Turkey. The Afghan rifles are called Zehail, and were usually made from old British firearm parts. I'm not sure what the inlays are made of. I don't think they want to sell the guns, just want info on them. The locks have dates on them, from early to late 1700s.
I hope to see them in person soon.

First question should be how she got them and when they came into the US. Khyber Pass fakes appear to be far more common than real ones. The bazaars in Afghanistan sell them by the thousands. Some are very good and impossible or almost to tell from originals. I was at one that had a Winchester 1895 in 405 that I almost purchased. It was 100% correct on the outside. When I opened the action it was close but clearly not a real Winchester.

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Originally Posted by M-Tecs

First question should be how she got them and when they came into the US. Khyber Pass fakes appear to be far more common than real ones. The bazaars in Afghanistan sell them by the thousands. Some are very good and impossible or almost to tell from originals. I was at one that had a Winchester 1895 in 405 that I almost purchased. It was 100% correct on the outside. When I opened the action it was close but clearly not a real Winchester.

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Please correct me if I'm wrong, Some one, a skilled trade smith in Afghanistan made a Winchester 1895 rifle clone in 405 with their bare hands and minimal tools, in a road side tent that was very very close to the original rifle????

They inherited the guns from a family member in Australia. That's about all I know. I will find out more when I see the guns. I read about fakes being very common.

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Originally Posted by beechbum444

Please correct me if I'm wrong, Some one, a skilled trade smith in Afghanistan made a Winchester 1895 rifle clone in 405 with their bare hands and minimal tools, in a road side tent that was very very close to the original rifle????

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OK I will correct you. You are wrong.

Don't have a clue (nor did I care since fake is fake) if it was a single person that built it or if it was one of the small factory's that copy numerous firearms with various manufacturing methods including CNC's. They range from crude to excellent. While I never owned a 1895 in 405 I have owned one in 30/40 Krag and am very familiar with the internals. The one I looked at was not an original despite outward appearance. I was looking for a real Synder or Martini-Henry for myself. After inspecting several hundred I never found one I was willing to purchase for myself but i did bring a couple of dozen back for others.

Synder's and Martini-Henry seemed to be the most common from what I've seen, however, the FA stuff was not allowed to be purchased by US troops at the bazaars I was allowed to go to. Browning HP's were common also. The Jezail Musket's were very common around the US bases in Afghanistan. Some of the fake Martini-Henry's were very very good and they have been imported or smuggled in the US in large numbers.

Some of the Khyber Pass guns were 100% handmade and other were manufactured at least in part on CNC machines. Some examples here:

https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/...pass-industry/

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/brit...eal-t7712.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khyber_Pass_copy

https://silahreport.com/2019/08/23/t...e-khyber-pass/

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q...arms&FORM=VDRE

There are lots of them for sale over here. The prices are usually much lower than other muzzle loaders. Probably because the quality of workmanship isn’t there. At least the ones I looked at. Often pieced together and not all original. They are usually inlayed with brass and mother of Pearl. I’ve seen some with gem stones too.
Im aware of all the copies being sold. They may be better crafted the antique ones.

A couple of those swords appear to be Japanese, or copies.

DG

So, I'm thinking that any traditional methods of IDing these guns, or placing a value on them (condition, provenance, etc) don't apply. Condition might not be important, or where it came from, or markings on the metal, etc.

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Originally Posted by Battis

So, I'm thinking that any traditional methods of IDing these guns, or placing a value on them (condition, provenance, etc) don't apply. Condition might not be important, or where it came from, or markings on the metal, etc.

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The real value is what someone is willing to pay for it. They are sort of a curiosity, that’s why I thought one picking one up.

Well, that went off the rails quickly. I saw the woman today who had approached me about IDing the guns, and she immediately launched into an anti- 2nd Amendment tirade. I had spoken to her maybe two or three times before (dog walking) and I knew she was a liberal but I kept politics out of it. Well, she didn't. That'll teach me to try and help a Massachusetts liberal woman ever again. Hypocritical little....ah, not worth it.

You should have told her that according to BATF, muzzleloaders are not firearms.

Yeah and the SAME hypocrite will be the one screaming bloody murder PUHLEEZ somebody come and help! HELP!! HELP!! Hoping and praying that somebody with a GUN will come to her rescue.

The hell of it is somebody with a gun could come get her out of a jam she would have not gotten out of if not for the gun, and chances are she will STILL rail against the 2nd. You can't fix stupid.

Bummer on the result - I might have humored the lady just to see the weapons first hand. With all that anti-gun stuff, why did she have those in the house?

I did tell her that they're not considered firearms by the feds. Made no difference.
Come to find out, she's part of an anti-gun organization - Mothers against guns or something like that. We had quite a lively "discussion" in a field (walking my dog) and other lib women joined in. I'm thinking that because of the organization she belongs to, she felt maybe a little hypocritical about having any firearm in the house, even heirlooms, and had to make a show of it. Oh well. Just wanted to walk my dog...

If your doggo takes a dump on her lawn - don't pick it up.

It's a farm a couple hundred acres in size. Plenty of room to avoid people, but my dog likes her dog.

The people who bought my yard go back and forth to A/stan......he ships car parts to all over the ME.......anyhoo,I mentioned guns.....and he's pffft.......carpets is where its at ,hes buying genuine antique carpets.

Tell her they are illegal full auto muzzle loaders and need to be turned into the police.

If she’s so anti gun she should sell them to you for a dollar to be rid of them.

I think she'd give them to me. She's really into the anti gun thing, way more than most. She had stats and theories that were basically left wing BS talking points. There's no reasoning with people like that. She said that guns were now the #1 killer of kids and I pointed out that they raised the age of a "kid" to 18 to pad those stats. Well, she said that studies now show that a person's frontal lobe of the brain isn't fully developed until they're 24 yrs old, so basically, up to age 24, people are still "kids." Crap like that...

Only real consolation is when the zombie apocalypse hits she will be among the first ones eaten.

I think it's already here. I see lots of people walking around, spouting insane nonsense.

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Originally Posted by jackrabbit1957

only real consolation is when the zombie apocalypse hits she will be among the first ones eaten.

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i thought the zombies wanted brains.

The Middle Eastern early long firearms have a most unique appearance. They do have collector value. Many years ago many of these eastern arms were imported into this country. They were moderately priced. Most were one of a kind, each hand made. Many were broken and damaged. I bought many that were broken from the importer. Most had British and European early locks. I bought the guns cheap and removed the locks and sold them for many times the purchase prices. They were great gun show items. Many of the barrels were hand forged very similar to the barrels that were hand forged lap welded on Pennsylvania-Kentucky long guns. Many had inlaid bone, ivory, and sea shell to enhance their appearance. The unusual buttstock design I figure was so they could easily be fired from horseback. Just tuck the gun under your arm and aim with one hand as your other hand held the reins !! The Arabic and North Americans Plains Natives were great horseman. Shooting from horseback was considered an art. Would be nice to have one in a collection of firearm developments.

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Originally Posted by beechbum444

Please correct me if I'm wrong, Some one, a skilled trade smith in Afghanistan made a Winchester 1895 rifle clone in 405 with their bare hands and minimal tools, in a road side tent that was very very close to the original rifle????

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OK2bKDxqBlE foot-powered lathes also probably involved... That is still happening in Darra Adem Khel, Pakistan. Not all that far from Afghanistan. I first read about those folks in a 1955, IIRC, American Rifleman, back when I was a kid in the mid-60's.

I have two with letters from the Afghan National Museum, allowing them to be removed from the country. If the guns pictured were removed without permission there could be consequences under the Afghan relics laws.
The junk copies are not relics, but my 1700s Tower lock, flint, camel rifle, is a relic under Afghan law, is a couple hundred years old, a 54 caliber star rifled barrel, with brass wide, thin forged, straps holding the barrel to the full stock. The smooth bore shotgun, flint to percussion conversion has a straight stock, with minimal what appears to be a silver wire inlay around and on the chamber area. Both guns are well used and have a dark brown patina from rust.

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could be consequences under the Afghan relics laws.

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We'll just call it even.

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Originally Posted by Scrounge

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OK2bKDxqBlE foot-powered lathes also probably involved... That is still happening in Darra Adem Khel, Pakistan. Not all that far from Afghanistan. I first read about those folks in a 1955, IIRC, American Rifleman, back when I was a kid in the mid-60's.

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There’s a video out about a guy who went and visited the Pakistani gun makers today. It was interesting.

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Originally Posted by Rapier

I have two with letters from the Afghan National Museum, allowing them to be removed from the country. If the guns pictured were removed without permission there could be consequences under the Afghan relics laws.
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Did you work directly with the Afghan National Museum to get those items lettered? Paperwork is easy to fake.

https://www.npr.org/2022/09/01/11202...tural-heritage

My question is, what types of consequences would result, and from where?

I remember reading a comment on a board (can't remember where), from someone that was deployed over there. He mentioned them finding crates of Brown Bess muskets in a cave still packed in the grease. Not sure if that was a tall tale or not, but I'd just about have a heart attack if I saw something like that. The ones in your photo are spitting images of some I have recently seen in a local shop. I eyed them through the glass, and determined them as newly made, as it's not hard to tell. The locks were copies. They have pretty good skill, and they have skill at making them 'look' old. That's not to say that there may not be some actual original parts strewn about some shops over there without anyone caring.

Apparently, the guns have been in the family over 30 years. They came from Australia. Now the "owner" is no longer with us and the family doesn't want the guns.

Times have really changed in my lifetime.
I went to a one room Country Schoolhouse and ya it was a 4 mile trip :D a lot of times I took the single shot .22 either over the handle bars on my bike or on the bare back horse horse in the winter to keep warm :D
Ms Mueller would tell me put it in the closet. After School we would go down to the open City dump and shoot rats.

A lot of this stuff going on I feel comes from Parents not paying attention to their Kids.