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Earliest known written formula for gunpowder, from the Wujing Zongyao of 1044 AD.. Gunpowder is the first explosive to have been developed. Popularly listed as one of the "Four Great Inventions" of China, it was invented during the late Tang dynasty (9th century) while the earliest recorded chemical formula for gunpowder dates to the Song dynasty (11th century).
The idea that gunpowder was a Chinese invention was not new to Europeans by then, and had been in circulation in Europe since at least the late 16th century. According to Juan de Mendoza, writing in 1585, the Chinese told the Portuguese that they had invented gunpowder, contradicting their own belief that "an Almane" had been the inventor.
This is a timeline of the history of gunpowder and related topics such as weapons, warfare, and industrial applications. The timeline covers the history of gunpowder from the first hints of its origin as a Taoist alchemical product in China until its replacement by smokeless powder in the late 19th century (from 1884 to the present day).
"The first cannon in history" used gunpowder almost identical with the ideal composition for explosive gunpowder. [ 12 ] [ 13 ] However, Iqtidar Alam Khan argued that it was the invading Mongols who introduced gunpowder to the Islamic world [ 14 ] and cites Mamluk antagonism towards early riflemen as an example of how gunpowder weapons were not ...
Gunpowder was invented in the 9th century by Chinese alchemists searching for an elixir of immortality. [19] By the time the Song dynasty treatise, Wujing Zongyao (武经总要), was written by Zeng Gongliang and Yang Weide in 1044, the various Chinese formulas for gunpowder held levels of nitrate in the range of 27% to 50%. [20]
However the use of gunpowder bombs in the style of Chinese explosives is known to have occurred in Japan from at least the mid-15th century onward. [86] The first recorded appearance of the cannon in Japan was in 1510 when a Buddhist monk presented Hōjō Ujitsuna with a teppō iron cannon that he had acquired during his travels in China. [ 87 ]
It is also known that an explosive material such as gunpowder must be invented 1st before inventing firearms (guns) in the Middle Ages. In Wikipedia's article about gunpowder, the first sentence of the third paragraph says " Gunpowder was, according to prevailing academic consensus, invented in the 8th century in China". But other sources say ...
Roger Bacon described the first gunpowder in Europe. "Vaso", the earliest illustration of a European cannon, from around 1327, by Walter de Milemete. In Europe, one of the earliest mentions of gunpowder appeared in Roger Bacon's Opus Majus in 1267. It describes a recipe for gunpowder and recognized its military use: