C96 Mauser Bolo

The Mauser C96 (Construktion 96)[12] is a semi-automatic pistol that was originally produced by German arms manufacturer Mauser from 1896 to 1937.[13] Unlicensed copies of the gun were also manufactured in Spain and China in the first half of the 20th century.[13][14]

The distinctive characteristics of the C96 are the integral box magazine in front of the trigger, the long barrel, the wooden shoulder stock, which gives it the stability of a short-barreled rifle and doubles as a holster or carrying case, and a grip shaped like the handle of a broom. The grip earned the gun the nickname "broomhandle" in the English-speaking world, and in China the C96 was nicknamed the "box cannon" (Chinese: 盒子炮; pinyin: hézipào) because of its rectangular internal magazine and because it could be holstered in its wooden box-like detachable stock.[15]

With its long barrel and high-velocity cartridge, the Mauser C96 had superior range and better penetration than most other pistols of its era; the 7.63×25mm Mauser cartridge was the highest-velocity commercially manufactured pistol cartridge until the advent of the .357 Magnum cartridge in 1935.[16]

Mauser manufactured approximately one million C96 pistols,[17] while the number produced in Spain and China is large but unknown due to poor production records.[13]