Indians For Guns

Hello,

I recently took out of my home storage space a British Musket which my father purchased a few years back from a local pub. I believe the Musket to be a Brown Bass although this hasn't been confirmed, hinting at the possibility of it being used in places such as USA,India etc by the British Army. The Musket is engraved with the British crown but is also engraved with Hindi Devanagari, which i have been told on a worldwide language forum.

The engraving reads out: राज, सीकर, तह, दाँ, रा, न: ४०

If possible could someone give me a more accurate translation of what this means? One user at the global forum was able to hint at the fact of it saying something along the lines of regiment 40.

If possible would also appreciate a confirmation of its type i believe it to be a Brown Bass however im not sure. Some history if possible would also be nice

Thank You

sikar county/district in the state of rajasthan/ then known as Rajputana.

न: stands for number and the digits are 40 as correctly stated.

the other letters and initials but to know what they stand for, i wouldnt know.

for eg: if i asked for what does D R stand for (not Dr.)

The engraving reads out: राज, सीकर, तह, दाँ, रा, न: ४०

If translated to English it reads राज, "Raj" is abbreviation for state of Rajputana(now called Rajasthan), सीकर, "Sikar" is the name of District in Rajputana, तह, दाँ, रा,(unable to make out with certainty what these three abbreviations stand for. Just guessing that तह, is abbreviation for "Tehsil" it means a sub division within the district, rest two are probably for village and Pin) न: ४० "Num: 40" is probably the model/serial number. You can try contacting the following, if they might know something more since they are into manufacturing replicas of antique firearms http://www.curioushouse.com/about_us.htm

It does indeed look like a Brown Bess. It may or may not be the original Brown Bess because of the use of Devnagri script(Hindi). I might be wrong. Those persons who are familiar with muskets/firearms manufactured in Sikar/Rajputana during British rule, will be able to tell if the local arms manufacturers used to engrave in Devnagri script.

'Raj' also means 'to rule'