Well, you've got the rifle in front of you - I haven't. But the style of the receiver is definitely Francotte Martini, and English gunmakers imported a lot of Belgian barrels.

The decoration on the receiver bothers me. One the right side, the patterning with the central circle matches in well with the receiver shape. On the left side it does not. The circular area is disturbed by a rectangular section that does not match up well with the top edge of the receiver. I suspect that the decoration was added by Ali Bubba.

Certainly the guts of the action look very Khyber-Pass, but as to the reciever itself, I think you will have to look very carefully at the inside surfaces of the box to see if it has been machined (in which case I would vote for a Francotte original) or hand-filed, in which case it is K-P.

If it is a Francotte/Belgian barrel and receiver, and the barrel is really good, then I would consider patiently looking out for properly made internal parts - maybe from a wallhanger - to get it back into operation again. You need to dismantle the entire action and clean all components to sort out any original bits from the hand-carved parts.


Patrick