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At the siege of Constantinople in 1453, the Ottomans employed several cannons, anywhere from 12 to 62. They were built at foundries that employed Turkish cannon founders and technicians, most notably Saruca, in addition to at least one foreign cannon founder, Orban. Most cannons at the siege were built by Ottoman engineers, including a large ...
The Dardanelles Gun is a similar super-sized cannon that was built in 1464 by the Turkish military engineer Munir Ali and modelled after the cannon built by Orban.. The Basilic, [1] or The Ottoman Cannon was a very large-calibre cannon designed by Orban, a cannon engineer, Saruca Usta and architect Muslihiddin Usta at a time when cannons were still new.
The account of the cannon's collapse is disputed, [6] [page needed] given that it was only reported in the letter of Archbishop Leonardo di Chio [60] and in the later, and often unreliable, Russian chronicle of Nestor Iskander. [70] Modern painting of Mehmed and the Ottoman Army approaching Constantinople with a giant bombard, by Fausto Zonaro.
He had offered his services to the Byzantines in 1452, a year before the Ottomans attacked the city, but the Byzantine emperor Constantine XI could not afford Orban's high salary nor did the Byzantines possess the materials necessary for constructing such a large siege cannon. Orban then left Constantinople and approached the Ottoman sultan ...
The Fall of Constantinople was perhaps "the first event of supreme importance whose result was determined by the use of artillery", when the huge bronze cannons of Mehmed II breached the city's walls, ending the Byzantine Empire, according to Sir Charles Oman.
Pius II promoted the affordable donation of cannon by European monarchs as a means of aid. Any new cannons after the 1422 siege were gifts from European states, and aside from these no other advances were made to the Byzantine arsenal. [1] As such, the next Ottoman leader, Mehmed II, would be successful in 1453.
With cannons mounted on its main towers, the fort gave the Ottomans complete control of the passage of ships through Bosphorus, a role evoked by its original name, Boğazkesen ("cutter of the strait"). After the conquest of Constantinople, it served as a customs checkpoint and a prison, particularly for the embassies of states that were at war ...
Around the same period, the Byzantine Empire began to accumulate its own cannons to face the Ottoman threat, starting with medium-sized cannons 3 feet (0.91 m) long and of 10 in caliber. [51] The first definite use of artillery in the region was against the Ottoman siege of Constantinople, in 1396, forcing the Ottomans to withdraw. [51]