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12 photographsArchive Record FUH-CM5R-Y8YA-Y
undetermined
Reference example
This pipe is documented here as an example for study — it is a record in the archive, not an item offered for sale. Everything below is what the piece itself, and the evidence around it, will honestly support.
| Country |
| London |
No dating evidence has been recorded on this example yet.
Owner-stated. Facts as reported with the piece; not yet independently corroborated.Attribution is our documented expert opinion with its evidence — never a certification.
Rim cleaned (no wood removed)
Yes
Faridunhill standing declaration
Refinished
No
Faridunhill standing declaration
Chamber reamed
Yes
Faridunhill standing declaration
Smoked
Yes
owner stated
Facts, not a grade. We do not score a pipe out of ten: a number would rank a restored pipe above an honest one, and restoration is exactly what this hobby prices down. Every line above is checkable by anyone holding the pipe. Lines marked Faridunhill standing declaration rest on our published, dated statement of shop practice (v1.0, 2026-07-29) — not on an inspection of this individual pipe. It is one document, in public, that you can hold us to.
MASTA over SMOOTH 9MM, with the number 189S and MADE IN LONDON over ENGLAND, is stamped on the shank of this pipe. It is a large Masta bent billiard in a smooth light-brown finish, with a black vulcanite saddle stem that ends in a fishtail bit. The pipe is made for a 9 mm filter.
Condition: pre-smoked, in very good condition.
THE MARKS - MASTA, with a large M, over SMOOTH 9MM, on the left side of the shank - 189S, on the shank - MADE IN LONDON over ENGLAND, on the shank
THE MAKER Masta pipes were made by the Masta Patent Pipe Co, and the pipes stamped MASTA form a small brand of their own. An advertisement of 1921 already lists MASTA PATENT pipes. In 1967 the Hardcastle and Parker firms merged as Parker-Hardcastle Limited, and the Masta Patent Pipe Co was taken into the new company as well.
THE SHAPE AND THE STEM A billiard is the classic pipe shape: a bowl shaped like a cylinder, set on a shank. In a bent billiard the stem curves down so the pipe hangs from the mouth. On this pipe the shank curves up into a black vulcanite saddle stem: the stem steps down to a flat, narrower part before the bend and ends in a fishtail bit, flat and widening at the end. With the stem out of the shank, the filter tenon can be seen in the photographs.
THE FINISH The bowl and the shank are smooth, in a light-brown finish. The bowl shows straight grain on one side and bird's eye grain on the other. The stamps sit on the shank, between the bowl and the stem.
DATING Neither the number 189S nor MADE IN LONDON over ENGLAND dates this pipe, so the year it was made cannot be fixed from its stamps.
THE MEASUREMENTS - Length: 137 mm (5.39 in) - Bowl width: 40 mm (1.57 in) - Chamber diameter: 20 mm (0.79 in) - Chamber depth: 51 mm (2.01 in) - Weight: 49 g (1.73 oz)
2026-11-09
Logged from the Faridunhill shop - photographed and listed on faridunhill.com, 2026-11-09.
This record is append-only. Nothing is deleted — a correction is a new entry that supersedes the old one, and both stay visible.
Nobody leaves empty-handed. If you hold the catalogue page, the dated advertisement, or a hallmarked sibling that closes one of these — or simply own this model and can measure yours — send it in. Contributions are checked, credited to you by name, and the record is updated with the date it changed.
Faridunhill shop post, 2026-11-09. Published to a third-party platform on that date and archived since — a timestamp we cannot move. It is evidence that this object existed and looked like this, then.
The photographs are the identity. 12 images of this pipe's grain, stamping and stem are held as its fingerprint. The handle above is only a handle: lose it, and the pipe can still be matched back to this record from its grain.