Class Book for the School of Musketry, Hythe / Prepared for the Use of Officers

by Ernest Christian Wilford

Before the introduction of gunpowder, all kinds of weapons, both offensive and defensive, were included in the term “Artillery,” which has since become restricted to the larger kinds of fire-arms, such as guns, mortars, howitzers, rockets, &c. Thus we find in the I. Saml. xx., 40, “And Jonathan gave his artillery to his lad,” when speaking of bows and arrows. Again, in the 20th, Henry VIII., a patent was granted to Anthony Knevt and Peter Mentas, “to be overseers of the science of Artillery;” and in an enumeration of the different species of Artillery, printed in 1594, are reckoned “long-bows, cross-bows, slur-bows, stone-bows, scorpions, and catapultas.”

Definition of Artillery.

The root of the word “artillery,” is the Latin word “ars,” an “art.” It has been fantastically derived from the Italian arte di tirare, the art of firing. In the fourteenth century the science of war-engines was called artemonie, and its productions artillerie, from the old French word artiller, “to employ art.” Some writers state that the word “artillery,” is derived from arcus “a bow,” the earlier species of artillery being termed arcualia.

First invention unknown.

It is difficult to determine with any degree of accuracy the epoch at which gunpowder and its resultants, fire-arms, were first employed for the purposes of war in any part of the world; and this difficulty is increased, at least, as far as regards Europe, from the fact, Names of gun—from old machines.that the first engines of war, depending on the use of gunpowder, were named after the old machines for throwing darts, stones, &c.

First mention of guns.

The earliest account which we have of gunpowder, where it is mentioned as applied to fire-arms, exists in a code of Gentoo Laws, and is thought by many to be coeval with the time of Moses. The notice occurs in the Sanscrit preface to the Code of Gentoo Laws, translated by Halhed, at page 53, viz:—“The Magistrate shall not make war with any deceitful machine, or with poisoned weapons, or with cannon or guns, &c.” Halhed observes: “It will no doubt strike the reader with wonder to find a prohibition of fire-arms in records of such unfathomable antiquity, and he will probably hence renew the suspicion, which has long been deemed absurd, that Alexander the Great did absolutely meet with some weapons of this kind in India, as a passage in Quintus Curtius seems to ascertain.”

Greek fire, earliest European combustible.

The Greek fire seems to have been one of the earliest attempts in Europe at the manufacture of a military combustible; Gunpowder known before in China.but there is some reason to believe that the Chinese had become acquainted with the nature of gunpowder long before the introduction or invention of the aforenamed substance; and they appear to have been the first who took any steps in its manufacture, or in that of weapons of war resulting from its use. Amongst the machines constructed by this extraordinary people, was one called “the thunder of the earth,” which is thus described by M. Reinaud; and M. Favé: Chinese explosive shell.“A hollow globe of iron was filled with a bucket of gunpowder, mixed with fragments of metal, and was so arranged, that it exploded on the approach of an enemy, so as to cause great destruction in his ranks.” Early Chinese cannon.The “impetuous” dart of the Chinese, was a round bamboo, about two and a half feet in length, lashed with hempen cords to prevent its splitting, and having a strong wooden handle fixed to one end, thus making its entire length about five feet. This was then charged with powder of different kinds, arranged in layers, over which were placed fire balls, which being thrown to a distance of thirty or forty yards by the discharge, consumed any combustible materials they might come in contact with.

A late writer, M. Paravey, has in a great measure established the fact, that gunpowder and fire-arms were known to the Chinese long before the Christian era; and it is mentioned in Chinese writings, Guns in China, 618 B. C.that in the year 618 B. C., a gun was in use, bearing this inscription, “I hurl death to the traitor, and extermination to the rebel.”