When does a handgonne become an arquebus?

[tenngun]

We try to file and define things now they didn’t in the past.
Musket was a big two man gun, then became a lighter one man shooting bayonet handle, matchlock then flint with a few snaphance and wheelocks thrown in. Finely a rifled precision percussion piece.
Fusils were light hunting ball throwers, now the name means a shotgun.
Gallon is a specific style of ship built in the sixteenth century, but the word was used well into the nineteenth for big Spanish ships.
Tomahawk was a war club long before it was a belt axe.
When we look at a past anything and try to draw a line it’s only arbitrary now, back then they call a thing, such and such then when their grand children saw a better thing their grand kids used the same name
When did a goone become an arqubus? When people started calling them that

 

[TobJohn]

We try to file and define things now they didn’t in the past.
Musket was a big two man gun, then became a lighter one man shooting bayonet handle, matchlock then flint with a few snaphance and wheelocks thrown in. Finely a rifled precision percussion piece.
Fusils were light hunting ball throwers, now the name means a shotgun.
Gallon is a specific style of ship built in the sixteenth century, but the word was used well into the nineteenth for big Spanish ships.
Tomahawk was a war club long before it was a belt axe.
When we look at a past anything and try to draw a line it’s only arbitrary now, back then they call a thing, such and such then when their grand children saw a better thing their grand kids used the same name
When did a goone become an arqubus? When people started calling them that

All very true, but that is an entire other can of worms. Even when some of these terms were used in period, they are often bastardizations of foreign words. "archibuxoli" was used by the Italians in the 14th century to describe handgonners. My original interest was to find a dividing point for modern folk discussing these weapons.

On your main point though, English records on swords in this period are probably the best examples on how they did not care as much as we do as labeling. We care so much about "rapier", "broadsword", "arming sword", when historical records often just say "sword". Particularly relevant when arming military units because we are so focused on tracking down every detail when the records often say "musket of 'x' bullets to the pound and 'n' length" but then just say "sword" for the sidearm.

 

[tenngun]

All very true, but that is an entire other can of worms. Even when some of these terms were used in period, they are often bastardizations of foreign words. "archibuxoli" was used by the Italians in the 14th century to describe handgonners. My original interest was to find a dividing point for modern folk discussing these weapons.

On your main point though, English records on swords in this period are probably the best examples on how they did not care as much as we do as labeling. We care so much about "rapier", "broadsword", "arming sword", when historical records often just say "sword". Particularly relevant when arming military units because we are so focused on tracking down every detail when the records often say "musket of 'x' bullets to the pound and 'n' length" but then just say "sword" for the sidearm.

Having watched Star Trek as a kid I recall Scotty picking up a claymore, years later I made the mistake of calling a Blackwatch reinactors sword a claymore
I got a good lecture on claymore vs Scottish baskethilts. Oh my.
Well I jest as I really was interested as I had never heard it before.
Later in life I learned the Skye boat song. Written about 1880 the Scotts swords at Cullodun are called claymores
So when did we stop calling baskithilts claymores

 

[TobJohn]

Having watched Star Trek as a kid I recall Scotty picking up a claymore, years later I made the mistake of calling a Blackwatch reinactors sword a claymore
I got a good lecture on claymore vs Scottish baskethilts. Oh my.
Well I jest as I really was interested as I had never heard it before.
Later in life I learned the Skye boat song. Written about 1880 the Scotts swords at Cullodun are called claymores
So when did we stop calling baskithilts claymores

I first learned about the two types of claymore (“freeeeeddddoooom” type and basket hilt type) after Wikipedia-ing Mad Jack Churchill many years ago and that was a frustrating lesson in how words can mean many things