Editing Cannon (section)

===East Asia===
{{main|Gunpowder artillery in the Song dynasty}}
{{Further|topic=development of gunpowder warfare in China|Science and technology of the Song dynasty}}
[[File:Yuan Bronze Cannon.jpg|thumb|Bronze cannon with inscription dated the 3rd year of the Zhiyuan era (1332) of the [[Yuan dynasty]] (1271–1368); it was discovered at the [[Yunju Temple]] of [[Fangshan District]], [[Beijing]] in 1935.]]
The cannon may have appeared as early as the 12th century in China,{{sfn|Lu|1988}} and was probably a parallel development or evolution of the [[fire-lance]], a short ranged anti-personnel weapon combining a gunpowder-filled tube and a polearm.{{sfn |Needham|1986|pp=263–275}}  Projectiles such as iron scraps or porcelain shards, mixed together with the gunpowder ("co-viative"), were placed in fire lance barrels at some point,{{sfn|Crosby|2002|p=99}} and eventually, the paper and bamboo materials of fire lance barrels were replaced by metal.{{sfn|Chase|2003|pp=31–32}}

The earliest known depiction of a cannon is a sculpture from the [[Dazu Rock Carvings]] in Sichuan dated to 1128,{{sfn|Lu|1988}} however, the earliest archaeological samples and textual accounts do not appear until the 13th century. The primary extant specimens of cannon from the 13th century are the [[Wuwei Bronze Cannon]] dated to 1227, the [[Heilongjiang hand cannon]] dated to 1288, and the [[Xanadu Gun]] dated to 1298. However, only the Xanadu gun contains an inscription bearing a date of production, so it is considered the earliest confirmed extant cannon. The Xanadu Gun is {{convert|34.7|cm|abbr=on}} in length and weighs {{convert|6.2|kg|abbr=on}}. The other cannons are dated using contextual evidence.{{sfn|Andrade|2016|pp=52–53}} The Heilongjiang [[hand cannon]] is also often considered by some to be the oldest firearm since it was unearthed near the area where the ''[[History of Yuan]]'' reports a battle took place involving hand cannons. According to the ''History of Yuan'', in 1288, a Jurchen commander by the name of Li Ting led troops armed with hand cannons into battle against the rebel prince Nayan.{{sfn|Needham|1986|pp=293–94}}

[[File:Ming Dynasty field artillery cannon.jpg|thumb|A bronze "thousand ball thunder cannon" from the ''[[Huolongjing]]''.]]
Chen Bingying argues there were no guns before 1259, while Dang Shoushan believes the Wuwei gun and other [[Western Xia]] era samples point to the appearance of guns by 1220, and Stephen Haw goes even further by stating that guns were developed as early as 1200.{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=329}} Sinologist [[Joseph Needham]] and renaissance siege expert Thomas Arnold provide a more conservative estimate of around 1280 for the appearance of the "true" cannon.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=10}}{{sfn|Arnold|2001|p=18}} Whether or not any of these are correct, it seems likely that the gun was born sometime during the 13th century.{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=54}}

References to cannons proliferated throughout China in the following centuries. Cannon featured in literary pieces. In 1341 Xian Zhang wrote a poem called ''The Iron Cannon Affair'' describing a cannonball fired from an eruptor which could "pierce the heart or belly when striking a man or horse, and even transfix several persons at once."<ref>{{cite book|last=Norris|first=John|year=2003|title=Early Gunpowder Artillery: 1300–1600|publisher=Marlborough: The Crowood Press|isbn=978-1-86126-615-6|page=11}}</ref> By the 1350s the cannon was used extensively in Chinese warfare. In 1358 the Ming army failed to take a city due to its garrisons' usage of cannon, however, they themselves would use cannon, in the thousands, later on during the siege of [[Suzhou, Jiangsu|Suzhou]] in 1366.{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=66}}<ref name="Korean Broadcasting System">{{cite web |author=Korean Broadcasting System-News department |date=30 April 2005 |title=Science in Korea |url=http://seer.snu.ac.kr/trip/anc-4.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201012013159/http://seer.snu.ac.kr/trip/anc-4.html |archive-date=12 October 2020 |access-date=27 July 2006 |work=Countdown Begins for Launch of South Korea's Space Rocket |publisher=Korean Broadcasting System}}</ref>{{sfn|Chase|2003|p=173}}

The [[Mongol invasion of Java]] in 1293 brought gunpowder technology to the [[Nusantara (archipelago)|Nusantara]] archipelago in the form of cannon (Chinese: [[hu dun pao|''Pao'']]).<ref name=":2">{{Cite book|last=Lombard|first=Denys|title=Le carrefour javanais. Essai d'histoire globale (The Javanese Crossroads: Towards a Global History) Vol. 2|publisher=Éditions de l'École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales|year=1990|location=Paris|page=178}}</ref> During the [[Ming dynasty]] cannons were used in riverine warfare at the [[Battle of Lake Poyang]].<ref>{{cite book|title=Battle: a visual journey through 5,000 years of combat|author=R. G. Grant|edition=illustrated|year=2005|publisher=DK Pub.|isbn=978-0-7566-1360-0|page=[https://archive.org/details/battlevisualjour0000gran_e3z7/page/99 99]|url=https://archive.org/details/battlevisualjour0000gran_e3z7/page/99}}</ref> One shipwreck in Shandong had a cannon dated to 1377 and an anchor dated to 1372.{{sfn|Chase|2003|loc="Little is known about their armament, but Chinese ships did carry bronze cannon at this time, as evidenced by the wreck of a small two-masted patrol vessel discovered in Shandong together with its anchor (inscribed 1372) and cannon (inscribed 1377)."}} From the 13th to 15th centuries cannon-armed Chinese ships also travelled throughout Southeast Asia.{{sfn|Chase|2003|loc="Considering that Chinese ships armed with gunpowder weapons, including cannons, visited the region regularly from the 1200s to the 1400s."}} Cannon appeared in [[Đại Việt]] by 1390 at the latest.{{sfn|Tran|2006|p=75}}

The first of the western cannon to be introduced were [[Breech-loading weapon|breech-loaders]] in the early 16th century, which the Chinese began producing themselves by 1523 and improved on by including composite metal construction in their making.{{sfn|Xiaodong|2008|pp=41–61}}

Japan did not acquire cannon until 1510 when a monk brought one back from China, and did not produce any in appreciable numbers.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=430}} During the 1593 [[Siege of Pyongyang (1593)|siege of Pyongyang]], 40,000 Ming troops deployed a variety of cannons against Japanese troops. Despite their defensive advantage and the use of arquebus by Japanese soldiers, the Japanese were at a severe disadvantage due to their lack of cannon. Throughout the [[Japanese invasions of Korea (1592–1598)]], the Ming–Joseon coalition used artillery widely in land and naval battles, including on the [[turtle ship]]s of [[Yi Sun-sin]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/worldhistoryofwa00arch|url-access=registration|title=World History of Warfare|publisher=[[University of Nebraska Press]]|access-date=26 May 2008|last=Archer|first=Christon I.|year=2002|isbn=978-0-8032-4423-8|page=[https://archive.org/details/worldhistoryofwa00arch/page/211 211]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.groseducationalmedia.ca/vsc/korea1.html |title=Admiral Yi Sun-shin and Turtle Ships |author=Derrick Grose |access-date=22 September 2011 |work=Virtual stamp Collection |publisher=Grose Educational Media |year=2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120121114619/http://www.groseducationalmedia.ca/vsc/korea1.html |archive-date=21 January 2012}}</ref>

According to [[Ivan Petlin]], the first Russian envoy to Beijing, in September 1619, the city was armed with large cannon with cannonballs weighing more than {{convert|30|kg|lb|abbr=on}}.{{sfn|Dmytryshyn|1985|p=90}}