The percussion rifle from the Gatchina Palace and Estate Museume was made in the 1870s. It was meant for big-game hunting and must have belonged to Emperor Alexander II who, just as the first owner of the Gatchina Palace Count Grigory Orlov, was very keen on hunting, including bear hunting. But unlike Count Orlov, who had hunted for bears with a bear spear, the Emperor preferred to use firearms. The rifle was made by the famous gunsmith Nikolai Goltyakov from Tula. He came from a family which had several generations of gunsmiths. In 1840 Goltyakov opened his own workshop to make hunting weapons. In 1868 he gained the right to produce revolvers and pistols for the army and to sell them all over Russia. Nikolai Goltyakov manufactured both revolvers of his own design and weapons with mechanisms designed by foreign inventors — Colt, Galand and Lefaucheux. In 1852 he obtained the title of the gunsmith of ‘Their Imperial Highnesses Grand Dukes Nicholas and Mikhail Nikolaievich’ with the right to mark his weapons with the Imperial coat of arms. And in 1873 Goltyakov gained the right to be called Purveyor to the Court of King George of Greece. His weapons were often shown at various Russian and international exhibitions. The barrel of the rifle is made of blued iron and is octagonal in section. At the breech end it is decorated with a floral pattern in relief. Along the upper plane of the barrel there runs a deeply engraved inscription: ‘Purveyor to the Court, manufacturer Nikolai I. Goltyakov in Tula’. On the sides of the barrel there are monograms ‘КН’, ‘МН’ and ‘НН’ in relief, the coat of arms of Russia, two profiles of men and two medallions with images of double-headed eagles and inscriptions running around them: ‘Moscow Polythechn. Exhib.’ and ‘Moscow Polythech. Exh.’ The bore has six grooves. The rear sight is marked with figures 1 to 12. On the barrel there are stamped medallions of the Moscow Polytechnic Exhibition which took place in 1872. Weapons made by Nikolai Goltyakov (perhaps this very rifle) must have been demonstrated at the exhibition and won prizes. Actually, the Gatchina Palace also took part in that Exhibition. The Palace demonstrated 139 guns from its collection and won the large gold medal. Many items from that exhibition laid the foundation of the Polytechnic Museum in Moscow. It should be mentioned that the construction of the rifle is a bit old fashioned. By the time it was made the Russian army had already switched to using bolt-action breech loading rifles with unified cartridges, while this rifle was muzzle-loading and its owner had to spend a lot of time loading it as in the olden days. Of course, such construction was chosen not because the owner was short of money. On the contrary, it indicated that the owner belonged to the elite and could afford to spend as much time hunting as he wanted.