The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c27.34

v3.c27.34

¹ With reference to this statement, and the mention of guns as part of Bukka's armament, Firishta remarks that this was the first occasion on which the Muslims used guns in warfare in the Deccan. It is quite possible that a knowledge of the use of gunpowder in war had by this time reached southern India, for Ismā‘il b. Faraj, king of Granada, used artillery at the siege of Baza, in 1325, and cannon of brass, with iron balls, were made at Florence in 1326. Who the Europeans and Ottoman Turks, mentioned by Firishta as serving with the artillery, can have been, is not clear, for the Portuguese did not reach India until more than 130 years after this time. It is not, however, improbable that Europeans from the Eastern Empire and Venice occasionally found their way to India by way of Egypt and the Red Sea, or overland, either as independent adventurers or as the slaves of Muhammadan merchants. Both Europeans and Ottoman Turks were in great request at a later period, as gunners and artillerists.