Quote Originally Posted by fusilier View Post
That depends upon what you hope to learn. Do you want to know specifics about battles, or understand the systems of warfare and how they fit into the society of the time
You are either missing the point or, due to the debate, talking past me on this one. What I'm saying is that in the last 30 years especially, but really for much of the latter 20th and 21st Century, the shift has been away from the really good, comprehensive summaries like that made by polymath, multi-lingual geniuses like Hans Delbruck and Henri Pirenne or Von Clauswitz and the like, and into more specialized research that the generalists never really caught up with.

In other words, all the specific details contain major revelations which should be in the general histories but aren't. As I mentioned before, you can also see an example of this in microcosm on Wikipedia.

Kulikovo (1380) is a single battle, is it correct to assume that gunpowder weapons were significant in every battle they fought at that time? Is it even justified to believe that gunpowder weapons were commonly used at that time?*
Yes, absolutely, of course. In fact the Muscovites and the Russians more generally (though Veliky Novgorod was better) were actually a couple of generations behind most of the rest of Europe on gunpowder weapons. I have some evidence in fact that the defeat of the Mongols by the garrison at Krakow 100 years earlier was partly due to gunpowder weapons.

Based on your asterix, I guess you are aware of the high development of early gunpowder weapons by that time. By 1400 they were already making rifled barrels in the German towns. But I think while you are clearly well informed on firearms post 1500 (better than I am anyway) I think you are not at all on the early firearms, cannon and gunpowder.

Anyway, it's been enough generalizing, here are some specifics I quickly googled today.


Here are a couple of useful resources on early gunpowder weapons in general:
http://milpas.cc/rifles/ZFiles/Black...Matchlocks.htm

http://www.themcs.org/weaponry/cannon/cannon.htm

Timeline of cannon use (in addition to the Battle of Chioggia which you already mentioned, though cannons seem to have been used during the entire campaign of the 3rd Venetian Genoese War)

1326 Early cannons are depicted in manuscripts from 1326,
"De Nobilitatibus, Sapientii et Prudentiis Regum"
and "De Secretis Secretorum"
1333 Edward III orders gunpowder from a York apothecary
1338 Battle of Arnemuiden September 21 French with Genoese crossbowmen capture The Christopher which was armed with 3 guns of iron. The first gun shots were fired in a naval battle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Arnemuiden

"The Battle of Arnemuiden was a naval battle fought on 23 September 1338 at the start of the Hundred Years' War between England and France. It was the first naval battle of the Hundred Years' War and the first recorded European naval battle using artillery, as the English ship Christopher had three cannons and one hand gun"

"iii canons der fer ove v chambre" and "un handgone"
(3 cannons of iron with 5 chambers* and one handgun).

1350 Petrarch describes cannon as being in common use
1350 Liber Ignium (by "Marcus Graecus") and another manuscript by John Arderne publish gunpowder formulae and show images of cannons being fired.

1359 Battle of Barcelona

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Barcelona_(1359)

"a bombard was mounted aboard the Catalan nau and her shots heavily damaged one of the biggest naus of Peter I"

1370 Gun foundry established in Augsburg

1377 gunpowder formula in manuscript from Rothenburg
1378 Venetian ships are bombarded by canon from Kotor
1382 gunpowder forumla in manuscript from Nuremberg

Handgonne from Danzig circa 1380 (I think it's a replica made from a wax mold)

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Encyclopedia Brittanica says:

"...by the middle of the 14th century, the English, French, Spanish, and other navies mounted guns. Most were relatively small swivel pieces or breech-loading deck guns located in the castles fore and aft, but heavier
guns were added later."

Battle of La Rochelle 1419
"Use of heavy guns by the Castillian fleet"

More to come...

Double-barreled handgonne circa 1420

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G

* 5 chambers suggests it was a breach-loader like many of the early cannon were