The fire lance: gunpowder in a tube

c. 950 War and siege instrument under review

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A bamboo tube of slow-burning gunpowder tied to a shaft: a flame-thrower lasting a few minutes, its open end pointed at the enemy. The earliest depiction of such a weapon, a demon of Mara's host holding a fire lance on a Buddhist silk banner from Dunhuang, dates from about 950.

At first only flame came out of the tube. Later shards, pellets and arrows were put into the powder and flew out with the fire, and the tube itself was strengthened: bamboo gave way to paper, leather, then copper, bronze and iron.

To enclose gunpowder in a tube and direct its action one way is to take a step from an incendiary mixture to a barrel. Needham calls the fire lance the ancestor of all metal-barrel guns and cannon.

Why this date

from an image. The earliest depiction of a fire lance, on a Buddhist silk banner from Dunhuang (Musée Guimet, Paris), is dated to about 950. Detailed written descriptions appear later, in the 12th century.

What it grew from

• First record of a saltpetre, sulphur and carbon mixture flaring up

  prerequisite for · Confidence: high

  The fire lance appeared when someone thought of enclosing the already invented mixture of saltpetre, sulphur and charcoal in a tube and directing it at the enemy.

  Link sources

  • Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 221 (1986), 221

    At some moment after the first invention of the deflagrative, ultimately explosive and detonative, mixture of saltpetre, sulphur and charcoal, it occurred to someone to enclose the low-nitrate powder in a tube, and make it play upon the enemy.

What grew out of it

• The metal barrel: a bronze hand-gun of c. 1288

  prerequisite for · Confidence: high

  The tube of the fire lance is the ancestor of every barrel: a direct line runs from the bamboo tube through paper and leather to metal, and on to the hand-gun and cannon.

  Link sources

  • Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 210 (1986), 210

    We now approach the tubular fire-lance, ancestor of all metal-barrel guns and cannon

  • Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 221 (1986), 221

    From this derived in the course of time all barrels whatsoever

• Gunpowder in a Latin text: the Book of Fires of Marcus Graecus

  influenced · Confidence: medium

  The same second transmission brought knowledge of fire lances, bombs and rockets to the author of the Latin Book of Fires.

  Dispute: Needham considers the Book of Fires Arabic in origin, so Chinese knowledge most likely reached it through Arab intermediaries rather than directly. No one has identified the specific source of the collection's gunpowder recipes.

  Link sources

  • Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 570 (1986), 570

    tackle the problems of how the Chinese discoveries and inventions spread out over the whole world

  • Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 570 (1986), 570

    (b) how the knowledge of fire-lances, bombs and rockets got into the hands of Hasan al- Rammah and Marcus Graecus by +1280

Node sources

• Needham J., Ho Ping-Yü, Lu Gwei-Djen, Wang Ling. «Science and Civilisation in China», vol. 5, pt. 7: «Military Technology: The Gunpowder Epic», Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 12 (1986), 12

  the Tunhuang banner of about +950 settled that question

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