The Mirat-i Sikandari, a history of Gujarat translated by Sir E. C. Bayley, speaks of an attack made by Mahmoud on certain pirates as early as 878 A.H. (A.D. 1473), but neither Bulsar nor firearms are mentioned. We are told, however, that during a previous expedition in the same year against the island of Sankhodhar, the infidels (Hindus) “resisted bravely and kept up a sustained discharge of arrows and muskets” (pp. 198-9).
Ferishta relates that during the siege of Champanir, 1484, a shell (hookah) fell on the Rajah’s palace; but he does not state how it was discharged, nor whether it was explosive or incendiary.[260]
On landing at Calicut in 1498, Vasco da Gama and his followers were led through the streets with tomtoms beating, and from time to time an espingarda, or musket, was fired off.[261] The town seems to have possessed only one of these weapons. At least, the soldiers of the guard who mounted over Gama after he had been arrested were not armed with espingardas, but with swords, daggers, and bows,[262] and no mention is made of there being any cannon in the town.
In 1502 a sea-fight took place in these waters between a Portuguese man-of-war and a Moorish (Arab) ship, during which the Arab bore down on the Portuguese, “pouring in her shot, and then made away.”[263] The original says: “Una nube de flechas sobre nuestra gente y algunas balas;” i.e. a cloud of arrows and some balls.[264] These balls were undoubtedly cannon balls.
It is stated in MSS. 826-8, Bib. Nat., Paris, that in 917 A.H. (A.D. 1511-12) Modhaffer Shah of Gujarat sent to Kansuh, King of Egypt, asking him for arms and cannon to enable the Gujaratis to defend themselves against the Europeans; “the people of India not having hitherto possessed Artillery of any kind.”[265] In answer to this request, Hossain was sent to sea in command of a considerable fleet. If Mahmoud possessed ships with guns in 1482, how came it that in 1511 the Gujaratis were sending round the world begging for firearms? Had Mahmoud merely hired for the occasion from the Arabs the ships and guns with which he crushed the Bulsar pirates? It is impossible to say categorically; but two facts may be extracted from the foregoing conflicting statements—first, that firearms were used by Arab and Portuguese ships on the west coast of India before the Hindus possessed them, and secondly, that there was an espingarda in the town of Calicut in 1498.
Whatever doubt there may be about the exact date at which the natives of Western India first procured firearms from the foreign ships which visited their shores, there can be none about the first employment of artillery in Upper India.
As has been already stated, the machines of the Greeks were adopted at an early period by the Persians, from whom they were eventually borrowed by the Arabs, Mughals, &c. The Hindus in turn adopted the machines they saw employed by their invaders and named them, according to their custom, after the part of the world they came from—maghribíha = western (machines or manjaník). At the abortive attack on Rantambhor, 1290, Sultan Jalalu-d Din ordered Westerns to be erected.[266] The Hindus had collected materials for making incendiaries before being besieged in the same fortress by Sultan Alau-d Din in 1300. “Every day the fire of those infernals fell on the light of the Moslems, and, as there were no means of extinguishing it, they filled bags with clay and prepared entrenchments.... The Royal Westerns shot large earthen balls against that infidel fort.... The stones from the ballistas and catapults within and without the fort encountered each other half-way and emitted lightening.”[267] During the attack on Arangal, 1309, the Westerns “were played on both sides and many were wounded.”[268] The mud walls were so strong and elastic that the balls of the Westerns rebounded off them “like nuts which children play with.”[269] Eventually the “western stone-balls” formed a breach and the fort fell. Such is the account given by Amir Khusru who died in 1315, of whom Sir H. M. Elliot says (vi. 465):—“He is full of illustrations and leaves no manner of doubt that nothing like gunpowder was known to him.” Near the close of the century, 1398-9, the Hindus besieged by Timur in Bhatnir “cast down in showers arrows and stones and fireworks upon the heads of the assailants.”[270] At the attack on Chanderi, 1527-8, “the Pagans exerted themselves to the utmost, hurling down stones and throwing flaming substances on the heads” of Babar’s troops.[271] In 1528-9, the Hindus succeeded in igniting with “fireworks, turpentine, and other combustibles” some hay which the Mughals had collected in the fort of Lucknow. The heat became so intolerable that the Mughals retired and the fort was taken.[272]
It is needless to enlarge the list of quotations: incendiaries pursued much the same course in Upper India as in Greece and Arabia. No reliable evidence of an explosive is to be found until the 21st April 1526, the date of the decisive battle of Panipat, in which Ibrahim, Sultan of Delhi, was killed and his army routed by Babar, the Mughal, who possessed firearms great and small.[273]
On the introduction of Artillery the word maghribiha was gradually replaced by the more definite word feringiha = European. At Panipat the Artillery of the left centre was commanded by Mustapha Rumi, whose name is sufficient proof of his western origin. But traces of European artisans are to be found long before this. When the King of Gor crossed the Attok in the twelfth century, he had with him “skilful Franks, learned in all the arts.”[274] The success of the attack on Chitor in 1591, by Buhadur, Sultan of Gujarat, was chiefly due to his engineer, Labri Khan of Frengan = Frangistan, the country of the Franks.[275] Speaking of the Mughal Artillery in 1695, Dr. Careri tells us that it was “all, especially the heavy Artillery, under the direction of Franks, or Christian gunners, who had extraordinary pay.”[276]
Haidar Mirza gives us one or two details about Babar’s guns which deserve a passing notice.[277] There was a zarb-zan, or swivel gun, carrying a ball of 500 miskals, and a heavier gun throwing a “brass” ball which weighed 5000 miskals, and cost 200 miskals of silver. The former was drawn by four, the latter by eight pairs of bullocks. Let us adopt the weight of the miskal given in Steingass’ “Persian Dictionary,”—1-3/7 drachms = 39.045 grs. troy, which makes the weight of Babar’s large ball 34 lbs. nearly.[278] Its price, 200 miskals, would then be 7809 grs. troy of pure (silver), or (since our standard shilling is 87.27 grs. troy and its fineness 37/40) 96.7 shillings of our present money. The price of a 10.18 lbs. ball of the same material would consequently be 29s., including the cost of manufacture. The price of the English 4” bronze ball of 10.18 lbs. given here in Table X., is 26.468d., or about 22s. of our present money, exclusive of the cost of manufacture. Adding 7s. to cover the cost of manufacture,[279] its price would be about 29s. The value of the alloy in our shilling has been neglected here, and Queen Elizabeth’s money may not have been worth exactly seven times our money; but making full allowance for both these errors, the prices of the two balls approximate as closely as can be reasonably expected.