Editing Cannon (section)

===Islamic world===
[[Image:Great Turkish Bombard at Fort Nelson.JPG|thumb|right|The [[Dardanelles Gun]], a 1464 Ottoman [[Bombard (weapon)|bombard]]]]
[[File:Malik E Maidan.jpg|thumb|Malik E Maidan, a 16th-century cannon, was effectively used by the [[Deccan sultanates]], and was the largest cannon operated during the [[Battle of Talikota]].]]

There is no clear consensus on when the cannon first appeared in the [[Islamic world]], with dates ranging from 1260 to the mid-14th century. The cannon may have appeared in the Islamic world in the late 13th century, with [[Ibn Khaldun]] in the 14th century stating that cannons were used in the [[Maghreb]] region of North Africa in 1274, and other Arabic military treatises in the 14th century referring to the use of cannon by [[Mamluk]] forces in 1260 and 1303, and by Muslim forces at the 1324 siege of [[Huesca]] in Spain. However, some scholars do not accept these early dates. While the date of its first appearance is not entirely clear, the general consensus among most historians is that there is no doubt the Mamluk forces were using cannon by 1342.<ref name="Hammer2017">{{cite book |last1=Hammer |first1=Paul E. J. |title=Warfare in Early Modern Europe 1450–1660 |date=2017 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1351873765 |page=505 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ugkkDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT505 |access-date=9 September 2019 |archive-date=25 December 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191225064933/https://books.google.com/books?id=ugkkDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT505 |url-status=live }}</ref> Other accounts may have also mentioned the use of cannon in the early 14th century. An Arabic text dating to 1320–1350 describes a type of gunpowder weapon called a {{lang|ar-Latn|midfa}} which uses gunpowder to shoot projectiles out of a tube at the end of a stock.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=43}} Some scholars consider this a hand cannon while others dispute this claim.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=43–44}}{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=582}} The [[Nasrid dynasty|Nasrid]] army besieging [[Elche]] in 1331 made use of "iron pellets shot with fire".<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=77y2AgAAQBAJ&dq=hasan+al-rammah+fire+lance&pg=PA55 | isbn=9781135459321 | title=Medieval Science, Technology, and Medicine: An Encyclopedia | date=27 January 2014 | publisher=Routledge }}</ref>

According to historian [[Ahmad Y. al-Hassan]], during the [[Battle of Ain Jalut]] in 1260, the [[Mamluk]]s used cannon against the [[Mongols]]. He claims that this was "the first cannon in history" and used a gunpowder formula almost identical to the ideal composition for explosive gunpowder. He also argues that this was not known in China or Europe until much later.<ref name="Gunpowder Composition">{{cite web|last=al-Hassan |first=Ahmad Y. |author-link=Ahmad Y. al-Hassan |url=http://www.history-science-technology.com/Articles/articles%202.htm |title=Gunpowder Composition for Rockets and Cannon in Arabic Military Treatises in Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries |access-date=8 June 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226105129/http://www.history-science-technology.com/Articles/articles%202.htm |archive-date=26 February 2008}}</ref><ref name=Hassan>{{cite web|last=al-Hassan |first=Ahmad Y. |author-link=Ahmad Y. al-Hassan |url=http://www.history-science-technology.com/Articles/articles%2072.htm |title=Technology Transfer in the Chemical Industries |access-date=17 February 2007 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070427025528/http://www.history-science-technology.com/Articles/articles%2072.htm |archive-date=27 April 2007}}</ref> Al-Hassan further claims that the earliest textual evidence of cannon is from the Middle East, based on earlier originals which report hand-held cannons being used by the Mamluks at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260.<ref name="Gunpowder Composition"/> Such an early date is not accepted by some historians,<ref name="Hammer2017"/> including David Ayalon, Iqtidar Alam Khan, [[Joseph Needham]] and [[Tonio Andrade]]. Khan argues that it was the [[Mongols]] who introduced gunpowder to the Islamic world,<ref>{{cite journal |last=Khan |first=Iqtidar Alam |title=Coming of Gunpowder to the Islamic World and North India: Spotlight on the Role of the Mongols |journal=Journal of Asian History |volume=30 |year=1996 |pages=41–45}}.</ref> and believes cannon only reached [[Mamluk Egypt]] in the 1370s.<ref name="khan 6">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Khan|2004|p=3}}.</ref> Needham argued that the term {{lang|ar-Latn|midfa}}, dated to textual sources from 1342 to 1352, did not refer to true hand-guns or bombards, and that contemporary accounts of a metal-barrel cannon in the Islamic world did not occur until 1365.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=44}} Similarly, Andrade dates the textual appearance of cannons in middle eastern sources to the 1360s.{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=75}} Gabor Ágoston and David Ayalon note that the Mamluks had certainly used siege cannons by 1342<ref name="Hammer2017"/> or the 1360s, respectively, but earlier uses of cannons in the [[Islamic World]] are vague with a possible appearance in the [[Emirate of Granada]] by the 1320s and 1330s, though evidence is inconclusive.{{sfn|Ágoston|2005|p=15}}{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=75}}

[[Ibn Khaldun]] reported the use of cannon as [[siege machine]]s by the [[Marinid]] sultan Abu Yaqub Yusuf at the siege of [[Sijilmasa]] in 1274.<ref name="Gunpowder Composition"/><ref name="Hammer">{{Cite book|editor-last=Hammer|editor-first=Paul E. J.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=A9ggAQAAIAAJ|title=Warfare in Early Modern Europe 1450-1660|date=2007|page=297|publisher=Ashgate|isbn=978-0-7546-2529-2}}</ref> The passage by Ibn Khaldun on the Marinid siege of Sijilmassa in 1274 occurs as follows: "[The Sultan] installed siege engines ... and gunpowder engines ..., which project small balls of iron. These balls are ejected from a chamber ... placed in front of a kindling fire of gunpowder; this happens by a strange property which attributes all actions to the power of the Creator."{{sfn|Andrade|2016|p=334}} The source is not contemporary and was written a century later, around 1382. Its interpretation has been rejected as anachronistic by some historians, who urge caution regarding claims of Islamic firearms use in the 1204–1324 period as late medieval Arabic texts used the same word for gunpowder, naft, as they did for an earlier incendiary, naphtha.{{sfn|Purton|2010|pp=108–09}}{{sfn|Ágoston|2005|p=15}} Ágoston and Peter Purton note that in the 1204–1324 period, late medieval Arabic texts used the same word for gunpowder, {{lang|ar-Latn|naft}}, that they used for an earlier incendiary, [[naphtha]].{{sfn|Ágoston|2005|pp=15–16|ps=: "References to early use of firearms in Islamdom (1204, 1248, 1274, 1258–60, 1303 and 1324) must be taken with caution since terminology used for gunpowder and firearms in late medieval Arabic sources is confused. Furthermore, most of these testimonies are given by later chroniclers of the fifteenth century whose use of terminology may have reflected their own time rather than that of the events they were writing about."}} Needham believes Ibn Khaldun was speaking of fire lances rather than hand cannon.{{sfn|Needham|1986|p=47}}

The Ottoman Empire made good use of cannon as siege artillery. Sixty-eight super-sized bombards were used by [[Mehmed the Conqueror]] to [[Fall of Constantinople|capture Constantinople]] in 1453. Jim Bradbury argues that Urban, a Hungarian cannon engineer, introduced this cannon from Central Europe to the Ottoman realm;{{sfn|Bradbury|1992|p=293}} according to Paul Hammer, however, it could have been introduced from other Islamic countries which had earlier used cannons.<ref name="Hammer"/> These cannon could fire heavy stone balls a mile, and the sound of their blast could reportedly be heard from a distance of {{convert|10|mi|km|0}}.{{sfn|Bradbury|1992|p=293}} [[Shkodër]]an historian [[Marin Barleti]] discusses Turkish bombards at length in his book ''[[The Siege of Shkodra (book)|De obsidione Scodrensi]]'' (1504), describing the 1478–79 [[siege of Shkodra]] in which eleven bombards and two mortars were employed. The Ottomans also used cannon to control passage of ships through the Bosphorus strait.<ref name=":03">{{Cite journal|last=Ágoston|first=Gábor|date=2014|title=Firearms and Military Adaptation: The Ottomans and the European Military Revolution, 1450–1800|journal=Journal of World History|volume=25|issue=1|pages=85–124|doi=10.1353/jwh.2014.0005|s2cid=143042353|issn=1527-8050}}</ref> Ottoman cannons also proved effective at stopping crusaders at Varna in 1444 and Kosovo in 1448 despite the presence of European cannon in the former case.<ref name=":03" />

The similar Dardanelles Guns (for the location) were created by Munir Ali in 1464 and were still in use during the [[Anglo-Turkish War (1807–1809)]].<ref name="Schmidtchen 1977b, 226–228">Schmidtchen, Volker (1977b), "Riesengeschütze des 15. Jahrhunderts. Technische Höchstleistungen ihrer Zeit", ''Technikgeschichte'' '''44''' (3): 213–237 (226–228)</ref> These were cast in bronze into two parts: the chase (the barrel) and the breech, which combined weighed 18.4&nbsp;[[tonne]]s.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=y4aXo_125REC&q=dardanelles+gun&pg=PA461|title=War in Human Civilization|year=2006|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|location=New York City|last=Gat|first=Azar|isbn=978-0-19-926213-7|page=461|access-date=7 November 2020|archive-date=20 October 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211020080030/https://books.google.com/books?id=y4aXo_125REC&q=dardanelles+gun&pg=PA461|url-status=live}}</ref> The two parts were screwed together using levers to facilitate moving it.

Fathullah Shirazi, a [[Persian people|Persian]] inhabitant of India who worked for [[Akbar]] in the [[Mughal Empire]], developed a [[volley gun]] in the 16th century.<ref>{{cite journal|first=A. K.|last=Bag|year=2005|title=Fathullah Shirazi: Cannon, Multi-barrel Gun and Yarghu|journal=Indian Journal of History of Science|pages=431–436}}</ref>

While there is evidence of cannons in Iran as early as 1405 they were not widespread.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Khan|first=Iqtidar Alam|date=1999|title=Nature of Gunpowder Artillery in India during the Sixteenth Century: A Reappraisal of the Impact of European Gunnery|journal=Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society|volume=9|issue=1|pages=27–34|jstor=25183626|doi=10.1017/S1356186300015911|s2cid=162909942 }}</ref> This changed following the increased use of firearms by Shah Ismail I, and the Iranian army used 500 cannons by the 1620s, probably captured from the Ottomans or acquired by allies in Europe.<ref name=":02">{{Cite journal|last=Nourbakhsh|first=Mohammad Reza (Farhad)|date=2008|title=Iran's Early Encounter with Three Medieval European Inventions (875–1153 AH/1470–1740 CE)|journal=Iranian Studies|volume=41|issue=4|pages=549–558|jstor=25597489|doi=10.1080/00210860802246242|s2cid=144208564}}</ref> By 1443, Iranians were also making some of their own cannon, as Mir Khawand wrote of a 1200&nbsp;kg metal piece being made by an Iranian {{lang|fa|rikhtegar}} which was most likely a cannon.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Khan|first=Iqtidar Alam|date=1995|journal=Proceedings of the Indian History Congress|volume=56|pages=435–446|jstor=44158646|title=Firearms in Central Asia and Iran During the Fifteenth Century and the Origins and Nature of Firearms Brought by Babur}}</ref> Due to the difficulties of transporting cannon in mountainous terrain, their use was less common compared to their use in Europe.<ref name=":02" />