Fire arms according to Cortesi: a dream made of steel

I have paid a visit to the Cortesi workshop in Rimini, where Virgilio and his son Nerio are still working with more or less the same equipment a medieval gunsmith would have had: a great variety of chisels, saws, hammers and files.

Yesterday Nerio placed a big lump of steel in my hands. It was partially shaped, and he told me it will become an over and under gun. He is now working on the locks he has designed, with a little variation inspired by Purdey. It will be a self-opening gun, quite a rare feature in this kind of gun.

What about all the components of the lock? Nerio forges them by hand on the anvil, one by one, together with extremely long V-shaped springs that truly represent, by themselves, a work of art. I can confidently say that only three, maybe four gunsmiths in Europe would be able to make such pieces.

That steel ingot and those springs made my heart race. This is a crazy, impossible job, done by people in love with their own art. Do you have doubts? Come and see for yourself the way they work in their workshop. Here we are dealing with refined gunsmiths and real masterpieces created by experienced hands, something we must not lose or let die.

From an article by Gianoberto Lupi