Handgonne timeline

[Grizzled Roberts]

What would be a ball park time for the development of the handgonne?

 

[Zonie]

Not an easy question to answer.

Is a handgonne just a firearm that can be held in the hand and fired by inserting a red hot poker or touching a match to powder by its vent?

If so, small handgonnes could be dated as far back as 1320-1350. In 1364 the commune of Perugil ordered 500 "hand-bombards".

Claude Blair in his book "Pistols of the World" (Viking Press, New York) feels that although these were small and could be hand held they were more likely mounted on poles.

He goes on to say that although there were horsemen's maces and war-hammers with metal handles which were used as gun barrels in the late 1400's their use was impractical.

In his opinion there was really no use for a hand held gun that requires the use of the other hand to fire it.

For this reason he feels the earliest gonne that was self contained with a mechanical method of firing should be considered the first pistol.

These were the wheel-locks.

The first wheel-locks date is unknown but it is believed they existed shortly after 1500.
Leonardo da Vinci made drawings of wheel locks earlier than 1519 (he died in that year) and a early wheel-lock in a Munich museum shows it was made around 1523.

 

[Alden]

Development? Mid 1300's thru early 1400's. 'course no-one threw anything away and it's not like these didn't evolve...

There are no dates certain. They eventually attached a form of linstock to the pole-mounted handgonnes. They mounted bigger and bigger handgonnes on tillers with hooks. They mounted handgonnes on chest-placed stocks and added pans and that serpentine. But these're about another 100 years of technology advancement in the state of the art from what was simply what I call "a tube on a stick."

 

[Tinker2]

According to Wikimedia

The general consensus is that hand cannons originated in China, and were spread from there to the rest of the world.[2] The earliest firearm was "discovered... in Manchuria dating from the 1200s"


William Alexander

 

[Alden]

When someone from the West refers to this issue they are usually excluding China, fireworks, the invention of gunpowder itself, etc.

 

[Grizzled Roberts]

Thank you all, I have a time frame now. I picked up one a couple weeks ago it is a simple one just a stick with a barrel on it and a touch hole on top. I set up a weapons display at the Loch Norman Highland Games in three weeks. With the new addition I can set it up with my matchlock, wheel lock, dog lock and and flintlock of my choice. It should make for a good display showing the development of firearms. Again Thank you all. Excepting the Hand Bombard all mine are German arms.

 

[Alden]

Huzzah! What kind of/era matchlock is it?

And, don't forget to take a photo of the display for us man...

 

[Grizzled Roberts]

It is one of the big long German matchlocks Dixie Gun Works used to sell 20 years ago. I do plan to take pictures of my display for you guys. I am notorious for NOT taking pictures at events but I will try this time. My camera normally resides in my wesket pocket collecting dust!

 

[BillinOregon]

This aging baby boomer also votes yes for photos!

 

[robinghewitt]

Here's a pic from the collection that disappeared from the Rotunda in Woolwich.

These are monster wall guns, but what about that thing on the left? Is that a handgonne? :idunno:

This one doesn't really belong here, a combination match/flint just for fun :grin:

 

[Alden]

Possibly, can't see enough (I don't see a touchole and it looks rather uniformly modern and "turned" at first blush), but the hole implies there may have been wood, a stock, there and this was a later hackbutt of some kind.

Someone stole this bunch of guns from Woolwich? I sent a buddy of mine who was staying down there a couple of years ago to it but hadn't yet gone myself. ...on the agenda but after Portsmouth I've been too busy to do either.

 

[robinghewitt]

Someone stole this bunch of guns from Woolwich?

Not stolen, moved. The Rotunda was originally a magnificent, enormous 19th century tent. They like it so much they recreated it as a building and this gun collection went inside, the cannons outside. The Rotunda started to leak and being a "tent" the roof was a nightmare to repair so everything had to be moved.

Notable pieces. The only surviving English Civil War gun carriage, a Rabonet. The bombard discovered when they drained the moat at Bodiam Castle. A cannon and some other stuff pulled from the wreck of the Mary Rose by hook. The Chinese cannon with lumps sawn off for casting the Victoria Cross medals. An amazing collection of flintlock cannon igniters. A military rocket launcher from the British Armies brief affair with fireworks. The list goes on.

 

[Alden]

Moved. Recently? And to where -- redistributed amongst Woolwich, Leeds, Tower, Portsmouth... do you know!?

 

[Wes/Tex]

What you're seeng in the left of the top pic is a barrel from a wall gun with a barrel hook to take up recoil. http://images1.bonhams.com/image?s...&height=480&halign=l0&valign=t0&autosizefit=1