A Belgian gun: reading the Liège proof marks, dating it, and what « ELG » means

It is the first thing I correct on the forums. People search for « ELG 16 gauge shotgun » or « Liège firearms manufactory » as they would search for a maker. The letters ELG in an oval are the mark of the definitive proof of the Liège proof house, the official body that tested the barrel by firing an overcharge through it, then stamped it. Dozens of Liège makers and workshops, large and tiny, had their guns proved at the same house: the oval says where the gun was proved, never who made it.

The maker's name, when there is one, is elsewhere: on the barrel rib, on the lock plates, sometimes on the action. Many Liège guns carry none, and that is neither an anomaly nor a sign of a fake: it is a gun made for the trade, sold under the retailer's name or under no name. In that case the proof marks are all the gun will say about itself, and they say a great deal.

The proof house still exists, in Liège, governed today by a Belgian law of 8 July 2018. It proves guns, and it records in the Belgian central firearms register the guns imported into or made in Belgium.

On a Liège gun the marks read like a sentence, and each one closes a bracket of dates. The dates below are those of my directory, built by cross-checking the proof house's own plates with the reference authors; where the sources disagree, the directory says so.

EL in cursive script. The provisional proof of the barrel, before the breech is fitted, struck since 1852; since 1924 it applies to smoothbore barrels only. Its presence is normal; its absence on an old barrel deserves a question.

The Perron. The small monument on its plinth, Liège's emblem, struck since 1853 for the inspection of the locking system. It was already the house's only mark from 1672 to 1810. A Perron on the action or the barrels places the gun after 1853.

The ELG oval. Without star or crown it is the early form, 1811 to 1846, later reserved for muzzle-loaders. With a star under the letters and no crown, the gun was proved between 1846 and July 1893. With the star and a crown above the oval, it was proved after 11 July 1893; that is the « after 1893 » marker on Belgian guns, in that form until 1968.

The lion over PV. The smokeless powder proof, struck from 1898 to 1968 in that form. A Belgian gun without this lion was not proved for smokeless powder: it is very probably nineteenth century, and it was designed for black powder.

Crowned R. Rifled barrel, 1894 to 1968. Beware the homonym: an uncrowned R, 1846 to 1889, marked on the contrary a barrel rejected at proof.

A letter under a star. The personal countermark of the proof house controller, since 1877, suspended from 1968 to 1973. The letter I was never assigned. Published rosters of names contradict one another, so I do not reproduce them.

The gauge. In a lozenge, « 12 C » or « 16 C », from 1898 to 30 June 1924: a precious marker, the proof is from before mid-1924. In a cartouche with the chamber length, « 12-70 », « 16-65 », from 1924: the proof is from after 1924, and the original chamber is written down.

The date letter. From 1922, a small letter struck near the proof marks gives the year of proof. Four cycles follow one another: lowercase letters from 1922 to 1947, Greek letters from 1948 to 1961, lowercase again from 1962 to 1987, capitals in a non-alphabetical order from 1988 to 1999. The same letter therefore returns at several dates, and the rest of the marks decides. The date-letter tool in my directory does the conversion, letter by letter.

In front of a Liège gun I ask myself three questions in this order, before even looking for the date letter.

Is the oval crowned? No: the proof is from before July 1893. Yes: after.

Is there a lion over PV? No: no smokeless proof, so very probably a nineteenth-century gun and a black powder gun. Yes: the proof is from 1898 or later.

Is the gauge in a lozenge or in a « 12-70 » cartouche? Lozenge: between 1898 and mid-1924. Cartouche: after 1924.

Those three answers already give a bracket of twenty or thirty years. The date letter, if the gun is from after 1922, narrows it to one year: the year of proof, which is not necessarily the year of manufacture or of sale, a barrel being able to wait in stock. And a repaired or re-proved gun may carry two sets of marks from two periods: you then read the later one as a date of passage through the proof house, not as a birth date.

The directory page also gives the clues that cross-check: the type of lock-up, external hammers or not, the shape of the marks themselves, whose drawing changed with the house's tools.

They do not tell you the condition. A gun proved in 1926 may have spent forty years in a barn: the proof was worth what it was on the day it was struck. Barrel wall thickness, pitting in the bore, the fit of the barrels on the face, are measured at the bench and nowhere else.

They do not tell you today's chamber. The « 12-65 » cartouche gives the original chamber; a chamber may have been lengthened since, with no new mark. That is why I measure the chamber with a gauge before talking about cartridges, whatever the stamping says.

They do not tell you the powder the barrel can take today. An oval without the PV lion is a black powder proof: it is not a ban on firing, it is a statement of what the gun was designed for, and the question is settled at the bench, barrel by barrel, or by a re-proof at a proof house.

And they do not tell you the value. I do not value guns, here or by message: this site is not a shop. What I can do is help you read what you are holding, so that the conversation with a dealer or an auctioneer starts from the facts.

The chamber is read and measured as in the article on 12-65 versus 12-70 chambers; damascus barrels, common on Liège guns, have their own article; and what I check on a gun before buying it is in the one on second-hand guns.

Two words of law, as general information, because the question always follows the reading of the marks.

In France, the law classifies a gun by its mechanism and by the date of its model, not by the date of its proof. A shotgun with one shot per barrel is in category C, and acquiring it requires a title, a validated hunting permit, a shooting licence or a collector's card; only a gun whose model is earlier than 1 January 1900, and which is not on the list of guns of proven dangerousness, falls into category D, free to buy for an adult. A proof date of 1895 is therefore not enough to say « category D »: the model is what counts, and reading it is the gunsmith's job. An inherited or found gun is declared from the SIA account, the Interior Ministry's portal. The detail, category by category, is in the next article.

In Belgium, the Liège proof house records in the central firearms register only the guns imported into or made in Belgium; for the others, the provincial firearms services and the police zones are the contacts. The proof house asks the holder to identify the serial number, the gauge and the proof mark of each proved part themselves, before any appointment: that is exactly the reading described here. And it reminds you that the appointment settles neither the gun's category nor the legality of holding it, which belong to other authorities.

In both countries these rules change: France's did on 7 September 2025, Belgium's on 1 September 2026. The links at the foot of the page lead to the official texts, and a gunsmith or the prefecture will tell you what applies to your case, which I do not know. Outside France and Belgium, your own country's rules apply.