''Fathul Mujahidin'' is a military manual that was written by Zainul Abedin Shustari at the instruction of

Tipu Sultan Tipu Sultan (born Sultan Fateh Ali Sahab Tipu, 1 December 1751 – 4 May 1799), also known as the Tiger of Mysore, was the ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore based in South India. He was a pioneer of rocket artillery.Dalrymple, p. 243 He int ...

, the ruler of the

Kingdom of Mysore The Kingdom of Mysore was a realm in South India, southern India, traditionally believed to have been founded in 1399 in the vicinity of the modern city of Mysore. From 1799 until 1950, it was a princely state, until 1947 in a subsidiary allia ...

South India South India, also known as Dakshina Bharata or Peninsular India, consists of the peninsular southern part of India. It encompasses the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana, as well as the union territo ...

considered a pioneer in the use of

rocket artillery Rocket artillery is artillery that uses rocket explosives as the projectile. The use of rocket artillery dates back to medieval China where devices such as fire arrows were used (albeit mostly as a psychological weapon). Fire arrows were also us ...

Mysore Mysore (), officially Mysuru (), is a city in the southern part of the state of Karnataka, India. Mysore city is geographically located between 12° 18′ 26″ north latitude and 76° 38′ 59″ east longitude. It is located at an altitude of ...

started to equip their army with rockets in the 1750s and during the Second Anglo–Mysore War (1780–1784) Tipu and his father Haider Ali used this technology against British troops. Tipu Sultan used rockets in battle with the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

in the 1792 Siege of Srirangapatna, a battle at the end of the

Third Anglo-Mysore War The Third Anglo-Mysore War (1790–1792) was a conflict in South India between the Kingdom of Mysore and the British East India Company, the Kingdom of Travancore, the Maratha Empire, and the Nizam of Hyderabad. It was the third of four Anglo- ...

. Tipu distributed copies of his military manual to all of his officers. In the manual he defined 200 men to handle rockets within each of the

br>cushoons
with 16 to 24 cushoons of

infantry Infantry is a military specialization which engages in ground combat on foot. Infantry generally consists of light infantry, mountain infantry, motorized infantry & mechanized infantry, airborne infantry, air assault infantry, and marine i ...

. The personnel handling the rockets were trained to define the launch angle to properly affect the curve at which the rocket would land. Tipu also defined in the manual a multiple rocket launcher (much like a musical organ) that would launch up to 10 rockets. Some of the rockets had blades in the front of the bamboo guiding rods, while others were designed as incendiary rockets. Although not the first use of rockets by Mysore, the 1792 Siege of Srirangapatna reportedly began with showers of as many as 2,000 rockets fired simultaneously. According to Stephen Oliver Fought and John F. Guilmartin, Jr. in ''

Encyclopædia Britannica The (Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various time ...

'' (2008):

References

External links

{{cite web , title=The Tiger and The Thistle , url=http://www.tigerandthistle.net , focussing on Tipu Sultan and the Scots in India, 1760–1800 Military handbooks and manuals Early rocketry Rocket artillery Kingdom of Mysore Artillery of India 18th-century Indian books

See also

References

External links