ABSTRACT
The manufacture of firearms represented one of the most important specialisations in Brescia and the surrounding territory during the centuries of the early Modern period. The boom for Brescian weapons manufacturers began with the advent of portable hand-held firearms and the adoption of muskets and pistols, as part of regulation equipment for the individual soldier, by European armies. Local availability of iron ore, combined with the skills of the craftsmen, capable of creating products of great artistic value, which, at the same time, kept pace with continuing progress in the technology of war, made Brescia one of the principal continental centres for firearms production and the chief supplier to the armies of many states. Production was based on a myriad of forges spread out along the course of the Mella torrent which forms the valley known as the Val Trompia. These forges specialised in different phases of the production cycle, while the workshops where the assembly of the various parts took place were concentrated in Brescia itself. This article intends to deal with a brief reconstruction of the history of this particular manufacture, with specific regard to the organisation of the work (which was based on a long chain of specialised skills), in order to arrive at an analysis of the institutional set-up inside which the relationship between the different groups of craftsmen, was organised.
