Nicolas-Noël Boutet

Nicolas-Noël Boutet (31 August 1761 – 1833) was a French gunsmith and bladesmith who was director of the Versailles state arms factory. More than 600,000 weapons were produced under his directorship.^[1][2]

A case with a pair of flintlock pocket pistols with ebony grips and engraved steel barrels, c. 1805

Napoléon Bonaparte's sabre by Nicolas-Noël Boutet, presented in 1799

Biography

Boutet was born in Paris, the son of the royal gunsmith Noël Boutet, and became his father's assistant. In 1788, he married Leonie-Emilie Desainte, the daughter of his father's colleague, which gave him an even better position at court and the title of "gunmaker-in-ordinary" to King Louis XVI of France.^[3]

During the revolution he worked for Napoleon as director of the state arms manufactory.^[4]

He died in Paris.^[4]

See also

• Flintlock
• Napoleonic weaponry and warfare
• W. W. Greener

References

1. Elgood, Robert (1995). Firearms of the Islamic World: In the Tared Rajab Museum, Kuwait. I.B.Tauris. p. 61. ISBN 9781850439639. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
2. Hayward, John Forrest (1963). The Art of the Gunmaker: Europe and America, 1660-1830. Barrie and Rockliff. p. 189. Retrieved 18 April 2018. The master who was responsible for these revolutionary changes in fire-arms design was Nicolas Noel Boutet, who was born on August 31st, 1761. His father was Noel Boutet, arquebusier des chevaux-légers du Roi.
3. "Pair of pistols | Boutet, Nicolas Noel |". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 18 April 2018.
4. Nicolas-Noël Boutet in The Grove Dictionary of Art

• Nicolas-Noël Boutet on American Society of Arms Collectors