Jezail
- Category
- Rifle
- Barrel
- 1270 mm
- Weight, empty
- Not recorded
- Introduced
- 1700
About
What it is, and why it matters
The Jezail is a handmade muzzle-loading long arm widely used across Afghanistan and the wider region from the 18th into the 19th century. Built to order by individual craftsmen, no two are standardized: locks were either matchlock or flintlock (often salvaged Brown Bess lockwork from captured British muskets), barrels were sometimes rifled, and calibers commonly ran from .50 to .75 and larger. Its distinctively long barrel and horn-shaped stock gave it greater range and accuracy than contemporary issue muskets, and it was typically fired from a forked rest.
Jezails earned a fearsome reputation in the Anglo-Afghan Wars: their long rifled barrels outranged British muskets, letting Afghan marksmen pick off troops from beyond return-fire distance. Dr. Watson of Sherlock Holmes fame was famously written as a veteran wounded by a Jezail bullet.
Because Jezails were individually made, all specifications vary widely between examples. Barrel lengths from roughly 31 to 53 inches are documented; the value given is a representative long-barrel figure.
Specification
Everything measured
IdentityWhat it is, who built it and when.
- Manufacturer
- Afghan Gunsmiths (various)
- Category
- Rifle
- Country
- Afghanistan
- Status
- Out of production
- Produced
- 1700
DimensionsAs issued, without a magazine or an optic.
- Barrel
- 1270 mm
ActionHow it cycles, what trips it, and what feeds it.
- Firing mechanism
- Single action
- Trigger
- Single stage
- Capacity
- 1
- Magazine
- Internal
MaterialsEach swatch is the material itself, not a colour chosen to stand for it.
- Barrel
- Steel
- Stock
- Wood
BallisticsFrom the service cartridge, not a handload.
- Effective range
- 180 m
- Rate of fire
- 2 rpm
Trajectory
What the round does downrange
Solved from the muzzle figures and the bullet. The dashed rule is the effective range on the record, and the crosses are the steps the solver returned.
No load solved for this record yetThe flight path is computed from a cartridge and a bullet. This record has no ammunition filed against its chambering, so there is nothing to solve.
Features
What it has
What the record lists as fitted, drawn from the catalogue.
Muzzleloader- Flintlock or matchlock
Forked rest
Horn shaped stock- Handmade
Standing
How it compares
This record has too few measurements to compare with others yet.
Answers
Questions about the Jezail
What caliber is the Jezail?
The Jezail is chambered in Lead Round Ball (Musket).
How many rounds does the Jezail hold?
The Jezail holds 1 rounds, fed from an internal magazine.
How long is the Jezail?
The Jezail has a 1270 mm (50.0 in) barrel.
Who makes the Jezail?
The Jezail is made by Afghan Gunsmiths (various) (Afghanistan).
When was the Jezail introduced?
The Jezail was introduced in 1700.
Compatibility
Which parts fit this firearm
Studio
Every part that mounts on this, resolved
Not a list the maker typed out: the answer comes from the mounts this firearm exposes and the interface each part needs, so it stays right when either one changes.
- Every part that mounts on any firearm in the catalogue
- Interface standards, platforms and fit overrides
- The same answers through the API and the MCP server
Requires a signed-in GunSpec account on the Studio plan. The answer is computed per part, so it is not part of the public record.
Provenance
What the record holds
Every figure above was taken from one of these pages. The confidence reflects how much of the record came from a page a claim can be checked against.
In service
- Afghan tribesmen
- Afghanistan
Provenance
Confidence in this record
58%
Stockists
Where to buy
Offers link straight to the shop. GunSpec never takes the order.
No shop has listed this firearm yet
Stock and prices come from the shops themselves. If you sell this firearm, you can list it and it appears here.
List a firearmMCP
Ask an assistant about it
The same record, reached the way a person asks for it rather than the way a program does.
Ask GunSpec
Works with
Point an MCP client at GunSpec and it answers from the catalogue rather than from memory. A free key covers the read tools.
API
The call that returns this record
The same fields, in the same units, from the same endpoint the page reads.
curl --request GET \ --url 'https://api.gunspec.io/v1/firearms/jezail' \ --header 'X-API-Key: your_key'{ "id": "jezail", "name": "Jezail", "manufacturer": { "id": "afghan-gunsmiths", "name": "Afghan Gunsmiths (various)", "countryCode": "AF", "foundedYear": null, "website": null, "logoUrl": null, "description": null, "status": null, "defunctYear": null, "stateOwned": null, "makesFirearms": null, "parentId": null, "predecessorId": null, "createdAt": "2026-06-21 23:00:46", "updatedAt": "2026-06-21 23:00:46", "version": "61f952bcfef38a421a0f520a096fa7eb52c0910f023a21d4c20e35036bf5d9c2" }, "category": { "id": "rifle", "name": "Rifle", "description": "Long-barreled firearms designed for accurate shooting" }, "country_of_origin": "AF", "year_introduced": 1700, "barrel_length_mm": 1270, "weight_empty_g": null, "action_type": null}