A breech-loading swivel gun was a particular type of
swivel gun
The term swivel gun (or simply swivel) usually refers to a small cannon, mounted on a swiveling stand or fork which allows a very wide arc of movement. Another type of firearm referred to as a swivel gun was an early flintlock combination gun w ...
and a small
breech-loading cannon invented in the 14th century. It was equipped with a
swivel for easy rotation and was loaded by inserting a mug-shaped device called a chamber or breech block, filled with
gunpowder
Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate ( saltpeter) ...
and projectiles. It had a high rate of fire, as several chambers could be prepared in advance and quickly fired in succession and was especially effective in
anti-personnel
An anti-personnel weapon is a weapon primarily used to maim or kill infantry and other personnel not behind armor, as opposed to attacking structures or vehicles, or hunting game. The development of defensive fortification and combat vehicle ...
roles. It was used for centuries by many countries of
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...
,
Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an ...
and
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
.
Characteristics
Although
breech-loading
A breechloader is a firearm in which the user loads the ammunition ( cartridge or shell) via the rear (breech) end of its barrel, as opposed to a muzzleloader, which loads ammunition via the front ( muzzle).
Modern firearms are generally b ...
is often considered a modern innovation which facilitated the loading of cannons,
[Turnbull, p. 105] breech-loading swivel guns were invented in the 14th century, and used worldwide from the 16th century onward by numerous countries, many of them non-European. They have been called by many names, sometimes "Murderer", "Base", "Sling", "Port-Piece", "Serpentine", "Culverin", "Pierrier", "Stock Fowler", and "Patterero" in English;
"Pierrier à boîte" in French; "Berço" in Portuguese; "Verso" in Spanish; "
Prangi" in Turkish;
"
Kammerschlange" (lit. "chamber snake", properly means "breech-loading
falconet") in German; "
Folangji
Farang ( fa, فرنگ) is a Persian (and Southeast Asian) word that originally referred to the Franks (the major Germanic tribe) and later came to refer to White Europeans in general. The word "Farang" is a cognate and originates from Old ...
" (佛郎机, from
Turkish
Turkish may refer to:
*a Turkic language spoken by the Turks
* of or about Turkey
** Turkish language
*** Turkish alphabet
** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation
*** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey
*** Turkish communities and mi ...
"Prangi" or
Turkic
Turkic may refer to:
* anything related to the country of Turkey
* Turkic languages, a language family of at least thirty-five documented languages
** Turkic alphabets (disambiguation)
** Turkish language, the most widely spoken Turkic language
* ...
"Farangi"),
"Folangji chong"
(佛郎机铳, Prangi or Farangi gun),
"Fo-lang-chi p'ao" (佛朗机炮 or 佛朗機砲,
Portuguese cannon)
in Chinese; "Bulang-kipo" ("불랑기포
郞機砲) in Korean; "Furanki" (仏郎機砲, "Frankish gun") or 子砲 ("Child cannon") in Japanese;
[Musée de l'Armée, Paris.] and "Bedil" or "bḍil" (ꦧꦣꦶꦭ) in Javanese.
Some of them were used until the 20th century.
Breech-loading swivel guns were developed surprisingly early, and were used from 1364 onward.
The guns were loaded with
mug-shaped chambers, in which gunpowder and projectile had been filled in advance. The chamber was then put in place, blocked with a wedge, and then fired. As the loading was made in advance and separately, breech-loading swivel guns were quick-firing guns for their time.
[Perrin, p. 29] An early description of a breech-loading swivel gun puts the weight of the gun at , equipped with three chambers for rotations, each in weight, and firing a
lead
Lead is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metals, heavy metal that is density, denser than most common materials. Lead is Mohs scale of mineral hardness#Intermediate ...
shot.
[Turnbull p. 106] The guns had a disadvantage: they leaked and lost power around the chambers, but this was compensated by the high rate of fire as multiple chambers could be prepared in advance. Breech-loading swivel gun could fire either cannonballs against obstacles, or
grapeshot
Grapeshot is a type of artillery round invented by a British Officer during the Napoleonic Wars. It was used mainly as an anti infantry round, but had other uses in naval combat.
In artillery, a grapeshot is a type of ammunition that consists of ...
against troops.
[''Firearms: a global history to 1700'' by Kenneth Warren Chase p.143](_blank)
/ref>
During the Middle-Ages, breech-loading swivel guns were developed by the Europeans also partly as a cheaper alternative to the very expensive bronze cast muzzle-loading
A muzzleloader is any firearm into which the projectile and the propellant charge is loaded from the muzzle of the gun (i.e., from the forward, open end of the gun's barrel). This is distinct from the modern (higher tech and harder to make) desi ...
cannons, as bronze was many times more expensive than iron. As cast iron was not yet technologically feasible for the Europeans, the only possibility was to use wrought iron
Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.08%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4%). It is a semi-fused mass of iron with fibrous slag inclusions (up to 2% by weight), which give it a wood-like "grain" ...
bars hammered together and held with hoops like barrels. With this method, a one piece design was very difficult, and a fragmental structure, with separated chamber and barrel was then selected.
Around 1500, Europeans learnt how to cast iron, and shifted their cannon productions to one-piece iron muzzle-loaders. China started to adopt European breech-loading swivel guns from 1500 onward, limiting at the same time the production of their own muzzle-loaders, because of the high effectiveness of the breech-loading swivel gun as an anti-personnel
An anti-personnel weapon is a weapon primarily used to maim or kill infantry and other personnel not behind armor, as opposed to attacking structures or vehicles, or hunting game. The development of defensive fortification and combat vehicle ...
gun, which to them was more interesting than the sheer power of a cannonball.
Usage of the breech-loading swivel gun continued in Europe however, with, as early as the 17th century, characteristics very similar to the modern machine-gun
A machine gun is a automatic firearm, fully automatic, rifling, rifled action (firearms)#Autoloading operation, autoloading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as Automatic shotgun, a ...
or mitrailleuse.
Use
Breech-loading swivel guns were used to advantage at the bow and stern on warships
A warship or combatant ship is a naval ship that is built and primarily intended for naval warfare. Usually they belong to the armed forces of a state. As well as being armed, warships are designed to withstand damage and are usually faster and ...
, but were also used in fortifications.
Breech loading guns were used by Burgundians as early as 1364. The Portuguese had ''versos'' (''Berços'') in ca. 1410, while England has a picture of port-pieces of 1417, although the picture itself was made ca. 1485. The Ottomans used the prangi from the mid-15th century onwards in field battles, aboard their ships, and in their forts, where prangis often comprised the majority of the ordnance.[Agoston, Gabor (2019)]
''Firangi'', ''Zarbzan, and Rum Dasturi'': The Ottomans and the Diffusion of Firearms in Asia
In Pál Fodor, Nándor E. Kovács and Benedek Péri eds., ''Şerefe. Studies in Honour of Prof. Géza Dávid on His Seventieth Birthday'', Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Budapest: Research Center for the Humanities, 89–104. These weapons would spread eastward to Indian ocean, eventually reaching Southeast Asia in ca. 1460 AD.
In China and Japan, breech-loading swivel guns were brought after China defeated the Portuguese in the 16th century. At the Battle of Xicaowan
The Battle of Sincouwaan (), also known as Battle of Veniaga Island ( Portuguese: ''Batalha da Ilha da Veniaga'') was a naval battle between the Ming dynasty coast guard and a Portuguese fleet led by Martim Afonso de Mello that occurred in 1522. ...
in 1522, after defeating the Portuguese in battle, the Chinese captured Portuguese breech-loading swivel guns and then reverse engineered them, calling them "Folangji" or "Fo-lang-chi" (佛郎機 – Frankish) guns, since the Portuguese were called "Folangji
Farang ( fa, فرنگ) is a Persian (and Southeast Asian) word that originally referred to the Franks (the major Germanic tribe) and later came to refer to White Europeans in general. The word "Farang" is a cognate and originates from Old ...
" by the Chinese. A shipwreck in 1523 apparently brought the gun to China, but the transmission may have occurred earlier. Views diverge on whether the origin of the cannon is Portuguese or Turkish. There was a confusion whether ''folangji'' was supposed to be the name of a people (the Portuguese) or name of a weapon. In fact the word ''folangji'' represent 2 different words with different etymology. The term ''folangji'' as a weapon is related to the prangi carried in Ottoman galleys and ''farangi'' used by Babur
Babur ( fa, , lit= tiger, translit= Bābur; ; 14 February 148326 December 1530), born Mīrzā Zahīr ud-Dīn Muhammad, was the founder of the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent. He was a descendant of Timur and Genghis Khan through his ...
. The word folangji as an ethnonym (Frankish or Portuguese) is unrelated. The Ottoman prangi guns may have reached Indian ocean before either Ottoman or Portuguese ships did. They may also reach China through the Silk Road. In the ''History of the reign of Wan Li'' (萬厲野獲編), by Shen Defu, it is said that "After the reign of Hong Zhi Hong may refer to:
Places
*Høng, a town in Denmark
*Hong Kong, a city and a special administrative region in China
*Hong, Nigeria
*Hong River in China and Vietnam
*Lake Hong in China
Surnames
*Hong (Chinese name)
*Hong (Korean name)
Organiz ...
(1445–1505), China started having ''Fu-Lang-Ji'' cannons, the country of which was called in the old times ''Sam Fu Qi''". In volume 30 about "The Red-Haired Foreigners" he wrote "After the reign of Zhengtong
Zhengtong () (18 January 1436 – 13 January 1450) was the first era name of Emperor Yingzong, the sixth emperor of the Ming dynasty of China.
Comparison table
Other eras contemporaneous with Zhengtong
* China
** ''Taiding'' (泰定, 1448–1 ...
(1436–1449) China got hold of ''Fu-Lang-Ji'' cannons, the most important magic instrument of foreign people". He mentioned the cannons some 60 or 70 years prior to the first reference about Portuguese. It was impossible for the Chinese to get hold of the Portuguese cannons prior to their arrival. Pelliot viewed that the ''folangji'' gun reached China before Portuguese did, possibly by anonymous carriers from Malaya. Needham noted that breech-loading guns were already familiar in Southern China in 1510, as a rebellion in Huang Kuan was destroyed by more than 100 ''folangji''. It may even be earlier, brought to Fujian by a man named Wei Sheng and used in quelling a pirate incident in 1507.
In Japan, Ōtomo Sōrin
, also known as Fujiwara no Yoshishige (藤原 義鎮) and Ōtomo Yoshishige (大友 義鎮), was a Japanese feudal lord (''daimyō'') of the Ōtomo clan, one of the few to have converted to Roman Catholicism (Christianity). The eldest son of , he ...
seems to have been the first recipient of the guns, possibly as early as 1551. In 1561 the Portuguese, allied with Otomo in the Siege of Moji
The was a siege in 1561 against the castle of Moji in Japan. The castle belonged to the Mōri clan, whose capital was the city of Yamaguchi.
Background
The original castle was built by Ōuchi Yoshinaga (Sorin younger brother), who was forced ...
, bombarded rival Japanese position, possibly with swivel guns. In the Battle of Takajō in 1587, Ōtomo Sōrin used two swivel guns obtained from the Portuguese. The guns were nicknamed .
In the later portions of the Ming dynasty (mid 16th century onward) it appears that these type of guns were the most common and numerous type of artillery used by the Ming forces. a great deal of variation of such cannons were produced, and it appeared in pretty much all of the conflicts of this time, including the Imjin War
The Imjin River ( in South Korea) or Rimjin River ( in North Korea) is the 7th largest river in Korea. It flows from north to south, crossing the Korean Demilitarized Zone, Demilitarized Zone and joining the Han River (Korea), Han River downstre ...
. Until the introduction of heavy Dutch cannons in the early 17th century, there were even attempts by the Ming to make large heavy versions of such guns.
Other countries also used swivel guns. In Bali
Bali () is a province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nu ...
, such a gun was found in the possession of the Raja of Badung
Badung is a regency of Bali, Indonesia. Its regency seat is in the upland town of Mangupura. It covers districts to the west of the provincial capital of Denpasar, and it has a land area of 418.52 km2.
The regency had a population of 54 ...
, and is now located in the Bali Museum. Numerous such guns were also used in Northern Africa
North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...
by Algerian rebels in their resistance to French forces.
Breech-loading swivel guns were also used extensively in Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...
as early as the 16th century, apparently even before the arrival of the Portuguese and Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
** Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Ca ...
there, and continued to be in use as a preferred anti-personnel weapon as late as the 20th century. The Americans fought ''Moros
In Greek mythology, Moros /ˈmɔːrɒs/ or Morus /ˈmɔːrəs/ (Ancient Greek: Μόρος means 'doom, fate') is the 'hateful' personified spirit of impending doom, who drives mortals to their deadly fate. It was also said that Moros gave peop ...
'' equipped with breech-loading swivel guns in the Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
in 1904. In early 20th century, Chinese junks were armed with old-fashioned swivel guns, both muzzle-loader and breech-loader. The breech-loading guns were called "breech loading culverin
A culverin was initially an ancestor of the hand-held arquebus, but later was used to describe a type of medieval and Renaissance cannon. The term is derived from the French "''couleuvrine''" (from ''couleuvre'' "grass snake", following the Lat ...
" by Cardwell, they were long with bore. These guns were fired using percussion cap
The percussion cap or percussion primer, introduced in the early 1820s, is a type of single-use percussion ignition device for muzzle loader firearm locks enabling them to fire reliably in any weather condition. This crucial invention gave rise ...
mechanism. Dyer c. 1930 noted the use of cannon by Makassan
Makassar (, mak, ᨆᨀᨔᨑ, Mangkasara’, ) is the capital of the Indonesian province of South Sulawesi. It is the largest city in the region of Eastern Indonesia and the country's fifth-largest urban center after Jakarta, Surabaya, M ...
trepanger in Northern Australia, in particular the bronze breechloader with bore.
Steel rifled
In firearms, rifling is machining helical grooves into the internal (bore) surface of a gun's barrel for the purpose of exerting torque and thus imparting a spin to a projectile around its longitudinal axis during shooting to stabilize the ...
breech-loading swivel guns are known which were manufactured by the United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...
towards the end of the 19th century, and used in colonial theaters such as in Madagascar
Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa ...
.[ Musée de l'Armée exhibit]
Gallery
File:Early breech loaders.jpg, Breech-loading swivel guns, 15–16th century. Swedish Army Museum
The Swedish Army Museum ( sv, Armémuseum) is a museum of military history located in the district of Östermalm in Stockholm. It reopened in 2002 after a long period of closure, and was awarded the title of the best museum of Stockholm in 2005. ...
.
File:40KgWroughtIronMurderer1410France.jpg, French breech-loading gun from 1410.
File:Japanese breech loading swivel gun cal 47mm length 159cm.jpg, Japanese breech-loading swivel gun. Caliber: 47 mm, length: 159 cm.
File:Oozutsu cannon Japan 16th century.jpg, A 16th-century swivel breech-loading Japanese cannon, called an ''Ōzutsu'' (大筒, "Big tube").
File:Description of swivel breech loading gun Japanese.jpg, Description of the mechanism of a breech-loading swivel gun in Japanese. 16th century.
File:Breech loading swivel gun Algeria 1906.jpg, Breech-loading swivel gun, Algeria
)
, image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Algiers
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, religi ...
, 1906. Caliber: 60 mm, length: 247 cm.
File:Perrier a boite cal 72mm length 140cm weight 110kg seized in Constantine in 1837.jpg, Breech-loading swivel gun, caliber: 72 mm, length: 140 cm, weight: 110 kg, seized by France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...
in Constantine in 1837.
File:불랑기포.jpg, Korean breech-loading swivel gun with mug-shaped chamber
File:Breech mug.jpg, 17th century Vietnamese breech block.
File:Madrid canons indiens.png, A double barrelled cetbang on a carriage, with swivel yoke, ca. 1522. The mouth of the cannon is in the shape of Javanese Nāga.
See also
* Culverin
A culverin was initially an ancestor of the hand-held arquebus, but later was used to describe a type of medieval and Renaissance cannon. The term is derived from the French "''couleuvrine''" (from ''couleuvre'' "grass snake", following the Lat ...
, also refers to breech-loading swivel gun
* Artillery of Japan
* Gunpowder weapons in the Ming dynasty
The Ming dynasty continued to improve on gunpowder weapons from the Yuan and Song dynasties. During the early Ming period larger and more cannons were used in warfare. In the early 16th century Turkish and Portuguese breech-loading swivel guns ...
* History of Bali
* Gunpowder weapons of Nusantara
Notes
References
* Perrin, Noel 1979 ''Giving up the Gun, Japan's reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879'' David R. Godine, Boston
{{DEFAULTSORT:Breech-Loading Swivel Gun
Firearm terminology