On Oct. 3, 1526, the Arsenal of the Republic of Venice paid 296 ducats to a master barrel maker from Gardone Val Trompia named Bartolomeo Beretta. In return he supplied 185 arquebus barrels. A record of the payment survived in Venice’s archives and is the oldest known document in Beretta’s history, and it is the reason the company has spent 2026 celebrating 500 years in business.
Beretta’s latest anniversary release takes that ledger entry literally. Its 92FS Ducato is a limited edition of 296 pistols, one for every ducat Bartolomeo collected, and it’s the fifth limited edition the company has produced for the anniversary. The Titan rifle and the 92FS Diamond were one-offs. The Ducato is a true production run, though a short one.
Mechanically, the Ducato is the Beretta 92FS that many shooters already know. Beretta’s specs call for a hammer-fired 9 mm with a double-action/single-action trigger and a 4.9-inch barrel. It is built on a steel frame and finished in DLC, a thin, hard diamond-like carbon coating used on everything from watch cases to bolt carriers. In addition, every pistol has its own serial number.
Gold accents mark the occasion, with a “500 Years” logo sitting at the rear of the slide. On the frame, a “500 Years Anniversary” engraving shares space with a small gold spark, Beretta’s anniversary-year symbol for the fire in Bartolomeo’s forge.
Most of the Ducato’s story lives in its grips. Beretta had them cut from Abonos oak, dug from riverbed deposits along the Sava, which flows from the Slovenian Alps to its meeting with the Danube at Belgrade. The wood comes from two native European species, pedunculate oak (Quercus robur) and sessile oak (Quercus petraea), and Beretta dates it at 2,000 to 5,000 years old.
Buried in waterlogged, oxygen-starved silt, the oak sat out of reach of the fungi and bacteria that would normally break it down. Over centuries, tannins in the wood reacted with dissolved iron and other minerals and gradually stained it toward black. Medieval scribes used the same basic chemistry to make iron gall ink. Each set of grips comes out of that process with its own grain and coloring.
Each grip panel carries a gold insert reproducing one face of a 16th-century Venetian ducat, the coin Bartolomeo was paid in. St. Mark and the doge appear on the left panel and Christ on the right. Venice had been striking gold ducats since 1284, and by his day the coin was one of the most trusted currencies in Mediterranean trade.
Beretta’s PB Selection Custom Atelier in Gardone Val Trompia builds the presentation case by hand using a heavily figured dark wood picked to match the grips, along with a metal Beretta 500 Years emblem at the center. Its red canvas interior is French-fitted, meaning it’s cut to the pistol’s exact contours, and a reproduction of the 1526 manuscript is stitched into the lining of the lid. Resting beside the gun is an authentic 16th-century Venetian ducat.
Paperwork makes up a good share of the package. Turin auction house Bolaffi certifies the coin’s authenticity. A separate certificate documents the age and provenance of the oak, and a commemorative document unlocks a digital 500 Years Limited Edition certificate for the individual pistol. Two magazines are also included in the box.
Irene Ferlito, product manager for Beretta’s PB Selection line, called the pistol “a tribute to the moment when it all began. The coin that inspired this limited edition represents more than monetary value; it is the first tangible sign of a story destined to endure for five centuries.”
Beretta Gallery USA lists the 92FS Ducato at $13,999 with either 15- or 10-round magazines and directs buyers to Beretta Gallery New York to reserve one. Bartolomeo, for the record, earned about 1.6 ducats per barrel. Anyone who buys a Ducato gets a whole ducat back, along with a 92FS to keep it company.
