Wick lock

The wick lock was invented in about 1430 ; its appearance made handling the gun much easier. The main differences in the device of the new weapon were as follows: the predecessor of the modern trigger arose - the serpentine lever located on the gun’s bed, with the help of serpentine the wick was actuated, which freed the shooter's hand. The seed hole was moved to the side, so that the wick now did not cover the target. On later models of wick shotguns, the serpentine was equipped with a latch holding it and a spring, a powder shelf for seeds appeared, which later became closed, there was also a variant of wick shotguns in which the trigger was replaced by a release button. The main disadvantage of the wick guns was their relatively low resistance to moisture and wind, the gust of which could blow off the seed, moreover, the shooter had to constantly have access to open fire, and in addition, the smoldering deposit remaining in the barrel channel threatened to instantly ignite the charged powder. Thus, loading a wick gun with a large amount of gunpowder became quite dangerous, and therefore, in order to protect the shooters from serious burns, bandoliers were introduced, equipped with containers containing less than before, the amount of smoke powder was exactly as much as needed to fire a shot.

The wheel lock invented at the beginning of the 16th century, however, did not supplant the wick castle because of its complexity and high cost; and only then the shock castle, invented afterwards , by the end of the 17th century basically displaced the wick. Nevertheless, in some regions, for example, in Central Asia, wick guns were used at least until the end of the 19th century ^[1] .

• The evolution of small arms
• Wick lock. History of appearance and development
• handgonnes