What is "matchlock"

Usage examples of "matchlock".

He had a tolerably large escort: two hundred Hebrian arquebusiers and swordsmen and eighty heavy cavalry armed with lances and paired matchlock pistols.

Each officer having soldiers under him traverses at intervals during the night every street under his jurisdiction, and these armed followers, whether to intimidate criminals or to show their vigilance, are in the habit of discharging their old-fashioned matchlocks and gingalls as they patrol.

The upland valleys had become a favourite hunting ground for the shikarees who used nets, snares and ancient matchlocks to kill hares, wild pigs, deer, quail and partridge that they sold to the officers, and Sharpe assumed a party of the hunters was close to the track, but after a few seconds the firing intensified.

So far they had fetched in three ancient matchlocks that must have belonged to shikarees, a broken musket of local manufacture, and a fine pistol and sword that had been taken from an engineer officer.

Rifles of 1632 might have had matchlocks, but were more likely to have a mechanical lock such as the snaphaunce or wheel lock.

Some were still using matchlocks, but mechanical locks like the wheel lock and snapping locks like the snaphaunce were becoming common.

Before another tenner passed, King JandolAnganol was armed with Sibornalese matchlocks -weapons supplied not by his allies in Pannoval or Oldorando, not forged by his own armourers, but brought by devious routes as a gift from those who were his enemies.

Before another tenner passed, King JandolAnganol was armed with Sibornalese matchlocks - weapons supplied not by his allies in Pannoval or Oldorando, not forged by his own armourers, but brought by devious routes as a gift from those who were his enemies.

Merchants in flowing silk robes sat cross-legged before their booths, extolling the quality of their goods--Mosul silk, matchlocks from Herat, edged weapons from India, and seed pearls from Baluchistan, hawk-like Afghans and weapon-girdled Uzbeks jostled him.

There were even musketoons, an ancient matchlock, six blunderbusses, eight duck guns, and a fine duelling pistol that had yet another bullet mould in its wooden case.

Now, counterbattery fire from the walls had become desultory, the dwindling number of losses from gun crews mostly being the result of long-range sniping with big bore wall-mounted matchlock calivers, but there seemed a dearth of notable marksmen within the city, for hits were rare, though the inch-or-more-in-diameter balls were almost certain to be the death of anyone so unfortunate as to be caught in the path of one.

Great Tourney had opened in the Valley of the Sepulcher upon the plains below the city of Nimmr, a band of swart men in soiled thobs and carrying long matchlocks topped the summit of the pass upon the north side of the valley and looked down upon the City of the Sepulcher and the castle of King Bohun.

Ibn Jad and four matchlocks belched forth flame and black powder and slugs of lead.

Guinalda and recognized her, but a volley from the matchlocks of the desert people sent the crudely armed soldiers of Bohun back in retreat, though the brave knight couched his lance and charged again until his hosse was brought down by a bullet and he lay pinned beneath it.

Their cutlasses were drawn and the smoke of their matchlocks blued the air, trailing out across the surface of the water.