Manufacturer catalog

Beretta

Beretta is an Italian firearms manufacturer based at Gardone Val Trompia with documented origins in a 1526 barrel order for the Venice Arsenal. The company remains a family-led small-arms producer whose modern catalog spans commercial firearms, military weapons, law-enforcement products, hunting arms, competition shooting equipment, and tactical shooting lines.

4 weapons

Beretta's industrial identity is unusually long-running for a weapons manufacturer. Company and holding-group histories trace the business to Mastro Bartolomeo Beretta's 1526 sale of 185 harquebus barrels to the Venice Arsenal, and Beretta states that the family has led the firm through 15 generations in Gardone Val Trompia.

The modern company is part of Beretta Holding but still operates around the Beretta firearm brand. Its public materials describe international production and commercial activity, while the military and law-enforcement range remains anchored by small arms such as pistols, rifles, and tactical shotguns. For catalog purposes, Beretta is most relevant where a weapon record identifies the manufacturer directly, including Cold War rifle development and later 90 Series pistol production.

Beretta's twentieth-century expansion paired legacy gunmaking with industrial modernization. The company says Pietro Beretta introduced modern manufacturing methods in the early 1900s, and Beretta later built multinational commercial and production activity in Europe and the United States. Its Gardone Val Trompia headquarters remains central to research, production, and corporate identity.

small armsmilitary firearmslaw-enforcement firearmssemi-automatic pistolsbattle riflesshotgunscivilian firearmstactical shooting

Notable Systems

Beretta BM59 rifle, Battle rifle, Infantry Weapons

Beretta BM59 rifle

Battle rifle

Beretta engineers adapted the M1 Garand lineage into the selective-fire BM59 battle rifle, with Italian deployment beginning in the early 1960s.

Sources: Small Arms Review BM59, Forgotten Weapons BM59
Beretta 92 pistol, 9x19 mm semi-automatic service pistol, Infantry Weapons

Beretta 92 pistol

9x19 mm semi-automatic service pistol

Beretta's 90 Series pistol family includes the 92/92FS line and the M9 U.S. military designation selected through the 1985 standard-sidearm procurement.

Sources: Beretta 90 Series, GAO Beretta 9-mm Pistol Procurement

Manufacturer History

  1. Documented barrel order

    Beretta Holding traces the business story to Mastro Bartolomeo Beretta of Gardone selling 185 harquebus barrels to the Venice Arsenal for 296 ducats.

    Sources: Beretta Holding

  2. Modernized manufacturing

    Beretta says Pietro Beretta introduced modernized manufacturing methods, patents, and simplified construction during the early twentieth century, positioning the company as a modern Italian firearms producer.

    Sources: Beretta company profile

  3. BM59 deployment begins

    Small Arms Review describes Beretta's BM59 as a Garand-derived Modello 1959 rifle and says deployment in the Italian military started in 1962.

    Sources: Small Arms Review BM59

  4. U.S. 9 mm pistol award

    GAO records the April 1985 Army contract award to Beretta U.S.A. for 9 mm pistols in the U.S. military standard-sidearm program.

    Sources: GAO Beretta 9-mm Pistol Procurement

Website links
Company profileFactory and historyBeretta Holding90 Series pistols

Manufacturer Sources

  • Beretta company profilePublisher: Beretta | Note: Supports Beretta's Gardone Val Trompia origin, 1526 founding, family leadership, product scope, early twentieth-century modernization, and current company identity. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Beretta factory historyPublisher: Beretta | Note: Supports the company's Gardone Val Trompia history and long-running firearms production background. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Beretta factory technologyPublisher: Beretta | Note: Supports Gardone Val Trompia headquarters context and current research and development activity. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Beretta HoldingPublisher: Beretta Holding | Note: Supports the 1526 Venice Arsenal barrel-order origin and Beretta's position inside the holding-group portfolio. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Beretta 90 SeriesPublisher: Beretta | Note: Supports the 90 Series pistol family, M9 adoption statement, and more than 4 million units sold claim. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • GAO Beretta 9-mm Pistol ProcurementPublisher: U.S. Government Accountability Office | Note: Supports the April 1985 Army award to Beretta U.S.A. for 9 mm pistols in the U.S. standard-sidearm procurement. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Small Arms Review BM59Publisher: Small Arms Review | Note: Supports Beretta engineering responsibility for the BM59 and early Italian military deployment context. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Forgotten Weapons BM59Publisher: Forgotten Weapons | Note: Supports the BM59 as Beretta's postwar Garand-improvement rifle with box magazine, bipod, and selector-switch changes. | Accessed: 2026-07-11
  • Beretta 92FS imagePublisher: Wikimedia Commons | Note: Rights-clear CC BY-SA 3.0 / GFDL source for the local optimized Beretta 92FS media asset. | Accessed: 2026-07-11

Produced weapons

Category

Infantry Weapons

Portable weapons used by soldiers and small units.

4/4
Beretta 92 pistol, 9x19 mm semi-automatic service pistol, Infantry Weapons1990 Gulf War, 2003 Iraq WarBeretta 92 pistol9x19 mm semi-automatic service pistolBuilt in: Italy / United StatesThe Beretta 92 is a 9x19 mm, double-action/single-action pistol family built around an open-slide, recoil-operated locked-breech design. The U.S. military M9 designation made the 92FS-family pistol a standard sidearm after the 1985 procurement award, with conflict records here documenting M-9 pistols in Desert Storm boarding-team context and M9 pistols in close-range fighting during the April 2003 Baghdad Thunder Runs.
Beretta BM59 rifle, Battle rifle, Infantry Weapons1982 Falklands War, 2022 Haitian Gang ConflictBeretta BM59 rifleBattle rifleBuilt in: Italy / Indonesia / NigeriaThe Beretta BM59 is an Italian selective-fire battle rifle that converted the M1 Garand architecture into a 7.62x51mm NATO, detachable-magazine service rifle. Beretta built the core Italian family, while licensed or locally produced patterns appeared in Indonesia and Nigeria. Direct conflict-use sourcing ties BM59-family rifles to Argentine small arms in the 1982 Falklands War and to criminal-gang firearms in Haiti's current gang conflict.
12-gauge shotgun, Shotgun, Infantry Weapons2022 Haitian Gang Conflict, 2012 Central African Republic Civil War +3 more12-gauge shotgunShotgunBuilt in: United States / Italy / Turkey / other countriesThe 12-gauge shotgun is a broad family of shoulder-fired smoothbore firearms chambered for fixed shotgun shells. Modern 12-gauge guns span pump-action, break-action, and semi-automatic layouts, while documented conflict roles range from Ukrainian short-range counter-drone defense and Central African militia small arms to Islamic State recoveries; Haiti coverage is narrower because the cited reporting identifies gang-held pump-action shotguns without confirming gauge.