An arquebus (/ˈɑːrk(w)əbəs/ AR-k(w)ə-bəs) is a form of long gun that appeared in Europe and the Ottoman Empire during the 15th century. An infantryman armed with an arquebus is called an arquebusier.
The term arquebus is derived from the Dutch word Haakbus ("hook gun").[1] The term arquebus was applied to many different forms of firearms from the 15th to 17th centuries, but it originally referred to "a hand-gun with a hook-like projection or lug on its under surface, useful for steadying it against battlements or other objects when firing".[2] These "hook guns" were in their earliest forms of defensive weapons mounted on German city walls in the early 15th century.[3] The addition of a shoulder stock, priming pan,[4] and matchlock mechanism in the late 15th century turned the arquebus into a handheld firearm and also the first firearm equipped with a trigger.
The exact dating of the matchlock's appearance is disputed. It could have appeared in the Ottoman Empire as early as 1465 and in Europe a little before 1475.[5] The heavy arquebus, which was then called a musket, was developed to better penetrate plate armor and appeared in Europe around 1521.[6] Heavy arquebuses mounted on war wagons were called arquebus à croc.[7] These carried a lead ball of about 100 grams (3.5 oz).[8]
A standardized arquebus, the caliver, was introduced in the latter half of the 16th century. The name "caliver" is an English derivation from the French calibre – a reference to the gun's standardized bore.[9] The caliver allowed troops to load bullets faster since they fit their guns more easily, whereas before soldiers often had to modify their bullets into suitable fits, or even made their own prior to battle.
The matchlock arquebus is considered the forerunner to the flintlock musket.
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The word arquebus is derived from the Dutch word Haakbus ("hook gun"),[1] which was applied to an assortment of firearms from the 15th to 17th centuries. It originally referred to "a hand-gun with a hook-like projection or lug on its under surface, useful for steadying it against battlements or other objects when firing".[2] The first certain attestation of the term arquebus dates back to 1364, when the lord of Milan Bernabò Visconti recruited 70 archibuxoli, although in this case it almost certainly referred to a hand cannon.[10] The arquebus has at times been known as the harquebus, harkbus, hackbut,[11] hagbut,[12] archibugio, haakbus, schiopo,[13] sclopus,[14] tüfenk,[15] tofak,[16] matchlock, and firelock.[17]
The musket, essentially a large arquebus, was introduced around 1521, but fell out of favor by the mid-16th century due to the decline of armor. The term, however, remained and musket became a generic descriptor for smoothbore gunpowder weapons fired from the shoulder ("shoulder arms") into the mid-19th century.[18] At least on one occasion musket and arquebus were used interchangeably to refer to the same weapon,[19] and even referred to as an arquebus musket.[20] A Habsburg commander in the mid-1560s once referred to muskets as double arquebuses.[18] The matchlock firing mechanism also became a common term for the arquebus after it was added to the firearm. Later flintlock firearms were sometimes called fusils or fuzees.[21]
Prior to the appearance of the serpentine lever by around 1411, handguns were fired from the chest, tucked under one arm, while the other arm maneuvered a hot pricker to the touch hole to ignite the gunpowder.[22] The matchlock, which appeared roughly around 1475, changed this by adding a firing mechanism consisting of two parts, the match, and the lock. The lock mechanism held within a clamp a 60-to-90 cm (2-to-3 ft) long length of smoldering rope soaked in saltpeter, which was the match.[22] Connected to the lock lever was a trigger, which lowered the match into a priming pan when squeezed, igniting the priming powder, causing a flash to travel through the touch hole, also igniting the gunpowder within the barrel, and propelling the bullet out the muzzle.[23]
While matchlocks provided a crucial advantage by allowing the user to aim the firearm using both hands, it was also awkward to utilize.[24] To avoid accidentally igniting the gunpowder the match had to be detached while loading the gun. In some instances the match would also go out, so both ends of the match were kept lit. This proved cumbersome to maneuver as both hands were required to hold the match during removal, one end in each hand. The procedure was so complex that a 1607 drill manual published by Jacob de Gheyn in the Netherlands listed 28 steps just to fire and load the gun.[24] In 1584 the Ming General Qi Jiguang composed an 11-step song to practice the procedure in rhythm: "One, clean the gun. Two, pour the powder. Three, tamp the powder down. Four, drop the pellet. Five, drive the pellet down. Six, put in paper (stopper). Seven, drive the paper down. Eight, open the flashpan cover. Nine, pour in the flash powder. Ten, close the flashpan, and clamp the fuse. Eleven, listen for the signal, then open the flashpan cover. Aiming at the enemy, raise your gun and fire."[25] Reloading a gun during the 16th century took anywhere from 20 seconds to a minute under the most ideal conditions.[26]
The development of volley fire—by the Ottomans, the Chinese, the Japanese, and the Dutch—made the arquebus more feasible for widespread adoption by militaries. The volley fire technique transformed soldiers carrying firearms into organized firing squads with each row of soldiers firing in turn and reloading in a systematic fashion. Volley fire was implemented with cannons as early as 1388 by Ming artillerists,[27] but volley fire with matchlocks was not implemented until 1526 when the Ottoman Janissaries utilized it during the Battle of Mohács.[28] The matchlock volley fire technique was next seen in mid-16th-century China as pioneered by Qi Jiguang and in late-16th-century Japan.[29][30] Qi Jiguang elaborates on his volley fire technique in the Jixiao Xinshu:
All the musketeers, when they get near the enemy are not allowed to fire early, and they're not allowed to just fire everything off in one go, [because] whenever the enemy then approaches close, there won't be enough time to load the guns (銃裝不及), and frequently this mismanagement costs the lives of many people. Thus, whenever the enemy gets to within a hundred paces' distance, they [the musketeers] are to wait until they hear a blast on the bamboo flute, at which they deploy themselves in front of the troops, with each platoon (哨) putting in front one team (隊). They [the musketeer team members] wait until they hear their own leader fire a shot, and only then are they allowed to give fire. Each time the trumpet gives a blast, they fire one time, spread out in battle array according to the drilling patterns. If the trumpet keeps blasting without stopping, then they are allowed to fire all together until their fire is exhausted, and it's not necessary [in this case] to divide into layers.[29]
In Europe, William Louis, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg theorized that by applying to firearms the same Roman counter march technique as described by Aelianus Tacticus, matchlocks could provide fire without cease.[31] In a letter to his cousin Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, on 8 December 1594, he wrote:
I have discovered evolutionibus [a term that would eventually be translated as drill] a method of getting the musketeers and others with guns not only to practice firing but to keep on doing so in a very effective battle order (that is to say, they do not fire at will or from behind a barrier ...). Just as soon as the first rank has fired, then by the drill [they have learned] they will march to the back. The second rank either marching forward or standing still, will then fire just like the first. After that the third and following ranks will do the same. When the last rank has fired, the first will have reloaded, as the following diagram shows.[32]
Once volley firing had been developed, the rate of fire and efficiency was greatly increased and the arquebus went from being a support weapon to the primary focus of most early modern armies.[33]
The wheellock mechanism was utilized as an alternative to the matchlock as early as 1505,[34] but was more expensive to produce at three times the cost of a matchlock and prone to breakdown, thus limiting it primarily to specialist firearms and pistols.[35]
The snaphance flintlock was invented by the mid-16th century and then the "true" flintlock in the early 17th century, but by this time the generic term for firearms had shifted to musket, and flintlocks are not usually associated with arquebuses.[36]
The earliest known examples of an "arquebus" date back to 1411 in Europe and no later than 1425 in the Ottoman Empire.[5] This early firearm was a hand cannon, whose roots trace back to China, with a serpentine lever to hold matches.[37] However it did not have the matchlock mechanism traditionally associated with the arquebus. The exact dating of the matchlock addition is disputed. The first references to the use of what may have been arquebuses (tüfek) by the Janissary corps of the Ottoman army date them from 1394 to 1465.[5] However, it is unclear whether these were arquebuses or small cannons as late as 1444, but according to Gábor Ágoston the fact that they were listed separately from cannons in mid-15th century inventories suggest they were handheld firearms.[38]
In Europe, a shoulder stock, probably inspired by the crossbow stock,[4] was added to the arquebus around 1470 and the appearance of the matchlock mechanism is dated to a little before 1475. The matchlock arquebus was the first firearm equipped with a trigger mechanism.[34][39] It is also considered to be the first portable shoulder-arms firearm.[40]
The Ottomans made use of arquebuses as early as the first half of the fifteenth century. During the Ottoman–Hungarian wars of 1443–1444, it was noted that Ottoman defenders in Vidin had arquebuses. Based on the earliest known contemporary written sources, Godfrey Goodwin dates the first use of the arquebus by the Janissaries to no earlier than 1465.[41] According to contemporary accounts, 400 arquebusiers served in Sultan Murad II's campaign in the 1440s when he crossed Bosporus straits and arquebuses were used in combat by the Ottomans at the second battle of Kosovo in 1448. Ottomans also made some use of Wagon Fortresses which they copied from the Hussites, which often involved the placing of arquebusiers in the protective wagons and using them against the enemy. Arquebusiers were also used effectively at the battle of Bashkent in 1473 when they were used in conjunction with artillery.[42]
The arquebus was used in substantial numbers for the first time in Europe during the reign of King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary (r. 1458–1490).[43] One in four soldiers in the infantry of the Black Army of Hungary wielded an arquebus, and one in five when accounting for the whole army,[44] which was an unusually high proportion at the time. Although they were present on the battlefield King Mathias preferred enlisting shielded men instead due to the arquebus's low rate of fire. While the Black Army adopted arquebuses relatively early, the trend did not catch on for decades in Europe and by the turn of the 16th century only around 10% of Western European infantrymen used firearms.[45][46] Arquebuses were used as early as 1472 by the Portuguese at Zamora. Likewise, the Castilians used arquebuses as well in 1476.[47] The French started adopting the arquebus in 1520.[48] However, arquebus designs continued to develop and in 1496 Philip Monch of the Palatinate composed an illustrated Buch der Strynt un(d) Buchsse(n) on guns and "harquebuses".[49]
The effectiveness of the arquebus was apparent by the Battle of Cerignola of 1503, which is the earliest-recorded military conflict where arquebuses played a decisive role in the outcome of the battle.[50]
In Russia, a small arquebus called pishchal (Russian: пищаль) appeared in 1478 in Pskov. The Russian arquebusiers, or pishchal'niki, were seen as integral parts of the army and one thousand pishchal'niki participated in the final annexation of Pskov in 1510 as well as the conquest of Smolensk in 1512. The Russian need to acquire gunpowder weaponry bears some resemblance to the situation the Iranians were in. In 1545 two thousand pishchal'niki (one thousand on horseback) were levied by the towns and outfitted at treasury expense. Their use of mounted troops was also unique to the time period. The pishchal'niki eventually became skilled hereditary tradesmen farmers rather than conscripts.[51]
Arquebuses were used in the Italian Wars in the first half of the 16th century. Frederick Lewis Taylor claims that a kneeling volley fire may have been employed by Prospero Colonna's arquebusiers as early as the Battle of Bicocca (1522).[52] However, this has been called into question by Tonio Andrade who believes this is an overinterpretation as well as a mis-citation of a passage by Charles Oman suggesting that the Spanish arquebusiers knelt to reload, when in fact Oman never made such a claim.[53] This is contested by Idan Sherer, who quotes Paolo Giovio saying that the arquebusiers kneeled to reload so that the second line of arquebusiers could fire without endangering those in front of them.[54]
The Mamluks in particular were conservatively against the incorporation of gunpowder weapons. When faced with cannons and arquebuses wielded by the Ottomans they criticized them thus, "God curse the man who invented them, and God curse the man who fires on Muslims with them."[55] Insults were also levied against the Ottomans for having "brought with you this contrivance artfully devised by the Christians of Europe when they were incapable of meeting the Muslim armies on the battlefield".[55] Similarly, musketeers and musket-wielding infantrymen were despised in society by the feudal knights, even until the time of Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616).[56] Eventually the Mamluks under Qaitbay were ordered in 1489 to train in the use of al-bunduq al-rasas (arquebuses). However, in 1514 an Ottoman army of 12,000 soldiers wielding arquebuses devastated a much larger Mamluk army.[55] The arquebus had become a common infantry weapon by the 16th century due to its relative cheapness—a helmet, breastplate and pike cost about three and a quarter ducats while an arquebus only a little over one ducat.[11][57] Another advantage of arquebuses over other equipment and weapons was its short training period. While a bow potentially took years to master, an effective arquebusier could be trained in just two weeks.[58]
The arquebus spread further east, reaching India by 1500, Southeast Asia by 1540, and China sometime between 1523 and 1548.[59][30] They were introduced to Japan in 1543 by Portuguese traders who landed by accident on Tanegashima (種子島), an island south of Kyūshū in the region controlled by the Shimazu clan.[30] By 1550, arquebuses known as tanegashima, teppō (鉄砲) or hinawaju (火縄銃) were being produced in large numbers in Japan. The tanegashima seem to have utilized snap matchlocks based on firearms from Goa, India, which was captured by the Portuguese in 1510.[60] Within ten years of its introduction upwards of three hundred thousand tanegashima were reported to have been manufactured.[61] The tanegashima eventually became one of the most important weapons in Japan. Oda Nobunaga revolutionized musket tactics in Japan by splitting loaders and shooters and assigning three guns to a shooter at the Battle of Nagashino in 1575, during which volley fire may have been implemented. However, the volley fire technique of 1575 has been called into dispute in recent years by J. S. A. Elisonas and J. P. Lamers in their translation of The Chronicl
