What I found in my basement...

[vbtb110]

This is my introduction here, so I guess its proper to say "hi" as well, to everyone. I am a long time milsim player, I've always had an interest in WW2 stuff, but I just don't have the funds / resources to do it, but I disgress. After fiddling around in my crawlspace for a little bit, I found a small cardboard box, with some writing on it. I open it up, to find this-





I have NO idea what it is, all I know is it says "Gardone" and "6.5mm" on the receiver. It has a little crown on the bolt handle as well. I'm pretty much puzzled, so I was just wondering how much this is worth / what is it / is it worth anything to anyone on here?

Thanks

[Medic]

SKS maybe? I don't know, but it kinda looks like one. Welcome to the boards

[TommyGunner]

It does look very russian, or maybe Italian?

TommyGunner

[CharleyNovember]

www.deactivated-guns.co.uk/detail/beretta_gardone.htm

google is your friend. Good little find there.

[Adler69]

That is a Moschetto Mo.91 Da Cavalleria, the caliber is 6.5x52mm Mannlicher-Carcano it was meant to be for Cavalry units but Alpinis (Alpine troops) used them and some Paracadutistis (paratroopers) used them as well . Cool find man , got any pics of the writting on the box?

[CharleyNovember]

Did some more snooping my self Adler as you had me curious.
Does this page look to be correct? I'm seeing they both have a fixed rear sight. and the afixed bayonet so I think this is it. Very interesting find indeed.
www.carbinesforcollectors.com/91_38cav.html

[vbtb110]

Yep, that looks to be the one, Charley. I was pretty astounded myself to find a rifle in my basement, and a 100+ year old one at that! The action is suprisingly smooth for a rifle that old, and I can even make out some rifling in the barrel, although there is a fair amount of gunk in it.

Adler: The writing has since faded off, I guess after a long time in a dark place, pencil doesn't do too well under lights. Now that you mention it, it did look very Italian and very old, it appeared to be script style.

I saw that the deactivated site was selling one of these, would this be of any worth to anyone? I can't see me getting any use out of it asides from it just sitting in my corner. If this is breaking some rule let me know, I just wasn't sure if someone could get more use out of this than I could.

How much would something like this be worth?

[YankeeDiv26]

First off, welcome to the board!

Nice find on the rifle, it sure isn't something that crawls out of a basement every day!

If it's a replica weapon that has been de-activated, then there's no rules against selling it here on the forum. A good idea to see the pricerange for what you have would be to search for them on grunbroker and/or other vendors and see what the average going price for one is. You could put it up for sale here, on gunbroker, or any number of places online.

<YD>

[2nd Bat]

We discourage the sale of real steel firearms on the sight but for now it remains an interesting discussion piece and provides some educational value. Certainly gun broker or simply taking it to a gun dealer is probably your best bet although as with anything rare or unusual get several opinions as to value.

Other than shotguns Italian firearms don't generally bring a lot but I am certainly no expert. Cool discovery.

[Tobbe]

The Mannlicher Carcano 38 of the same brand was the rifle Lee Harvey Osvald used to assasinate JFK with..I thougt this was a wind up when i saw the rifle and the balaclacva.. :-)
I doubt that the rifle is 100+ years old..I was the ones with a foldable bayonette the later ones..?

[oberst42]

OMG its lee harvey oswalds rifle