7 - Agents of Firearms Supply in Sixteenth-Century Italy: Rethinking the Contractor State

Summary

Abstract

This chapter investigates the people and organizations involved in the supply of firearms for military use in sixteenth-century Italy, as guns became a key technology in European warfare. Agents of supply ranged from gunmakers (including the Beretta firm) to ropemakers, from bankers to customs officials, from city captains to leatherworkers and scrap metal dealers. Through a ‘bottom-up’ exploration of this chain of supply and maintenance, considering both formal and informal processes, the chapter offers new perspectives on the functioning of the contractor state. It argues that the state's ability to purchase arms effectively depended on local patrons and connections and that the contractor state's development should be considered across the space spanned by supply chains as well as over time.

Keywords: Firearms, Guns, Contractor State, Arms Industry, Military Revolution

Introduction

On 16 August 1571, less than two months before the Battle of Lepanto, the Papal States contracted with Bernardino Busle of Brescia for the supply of 1,500 arquebuses. The contract, concluded by Bartolomeo Bussotto, Treasurer of the Holy See, stipulated the length of the gun barrel (four Roman palms), that it should be well-worked and reinforced at the breech and that it should be suitable for three-quarter ounce shot, as well as detailing how the accompanying powder flask and priming flask should be supplied. This may seem a straightforward transaction, but the reality of fulfilling such contracts was complex, even while they were essential to early modern warfare. In the military context, states frequently contracted out elements of defence, buying in not only weapons but also the services of mercenaries. Military entrepreneurs, whether producers or brokers, and their employees or sub-contractors, fulfilled this demand. The term ‘contractor state’ is used to describe the state in this role as purchaser of services: this concept is closely related to that of the fiscal-military state, which aims to account for how the state raised money to fund this activity.

Behind the entrepreneurs who supplied the contractor state, however, were many more individuals and organisations. Those involved in the supply of firearms for military use in sixteenth-century Italy ranged from gunmakers to ropemakers, from bankers to customs officials, from city captains to leatherworkers and scrap metal dealers.