Iron in Ancient India c6.s8: Iron Guns and Cannon

Iron in Ancient India c6.s8

Language: English

Iron Guns and Cannon

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It has already been pointed out that a form of iron fire-weapon was known even in Vedic times (p. 5). It is also undoubted that some sort of fire-weapon was known during the epic age as we find frequent mention of 'Satagni' (killer of hundreds), 'āgneya-astra' (fire-weapon), and 'nālika-astra' (tube-weapon) in the epics and ancient Sanskrit literature. But it seems that guns and cannon and the use of gunpowder were unknown in India before the Moghul conquest. Guns were first employed by Babar in the first battle of Panipat in 1526 and were introduced in Southern India by the Portuguese. Guns and cannon, as well as formula for the manufacture of gunpowder, have been given in a Sanskrit work entitled Sukraniti, a compilation evidently of the sixteenth century. In Sukraniti, khudra-nālika stands for small guns or matchlocks and brihannālika for big guns or cannon. The matchlock was 2½ cubits long with a longitudinal bore of the thickness of the middle finger and provided with two raised points in order to take aim.

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The gunpowder was ignited by means of a fuse, the fire being originated by percussion of powdered stone struck with a hammer. The matchlocks had wooden handles and were used by infantry and cavalry. The big guns were carried in carriages, had no wooden handles, and their range depended on the thickness of the metal-plate and bore, their length and size of balls.¹ These passages have misled many people, including the late Mr. Ramdas Sen, into believing that guns and gunpowder were known to the ancient Hindus. Dr. Rajendra Lal Mitra and Dr. P. C. Ray on the other hand regard them to be either spurious or in the nature of later interpolations.²

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¹ The original passages in Sukraniti are given below:—

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² I am afraid it cannot well be contended that the portions of Chapter IV which give accounts of gun, cannon and gunpowder were mere later interpolations, as guns and cannon have been mentioned in many places throughout the work, suggesting the idea that the work was written, at any rate rewritten, after the introduction of guns and gunpowder in India. Besides mentioning guns and gunpowder Sukraniti mentions Yavanas or Mlechchas living in 'North and Western' India, evidently referring to the Mussalmans. That the work could not have been written before the fourteenth century is borne out by the fact that it mentions 'Zinc' as one of the seven metals, while as a matter of fact only six metals were recognized

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नालिकं द्विविधं ज्ञेयं ह्यतुलुद्रविभेदतः ।
तिर्य्यूर्ध्वच्छिद्रसूत्रं नालं पञ्चमितस्तिकम् ॥
मूलाग्रयोर्लघुभेदं तिस्त्रविन्दुयुतं सदा ।
यन्त्राघाताधिरूढं तपाचूर्णैश्चकर्णमूलकम् ॥
सुकाष्ठीपाञ्चवद्धं सधातुर्विस्तारम् ।
सायेऽधिवृत्तं व्यासंमलाकासंयतं दृढम् ॥
लघूनालकमेयेतत् प्रधाय्यं पत्तिमादिभिः ।
यथा यथा तु लक्सारं यथा स्थूलविजानकरम् ॥
यथादीर्घं ह्यतुलगोलं क्रूरभेदि तथा तथा ।
मूलकोष्ठसमायुक्तं समसन्धानभाजि तत् ॥
इत्यग्निगोलसंज्ञं तत् काष्ठयन्त्रनिर्मितम् ।
प्रवाणैः शकटादेशु क्षुयुक्तं विजयप्रदम् ॥

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शुक्रनीति, IV, 7.

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Formulae for the manufacture of gunpowder (one formula being 5 parts of nitre, 1 part of sulphur and 1 part of charcoal) and description of shots and balls are also given.

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Tavernier, however, gives the credit of discovering guns and gunpowder to the Ahoms of Assam. In narrating the result of Mir Jumla's expedition to Assam in 1663 Tavernier wrote, "It is thought that these (the Ahoms) were the people that formerly invented gunpowder : which spread itself from Assam to Pegu and from Pegu to China, whence the invention has been attributed to the Chinese However, certain it is that Mirgimola brought from thence several pieces of cannon which were all iron guns, and store of excellent powder, both made in the country. The powder is round and small like ours and of excellent quality."¹ Mr. Gait in his *History of Assam*, however, writes that there was no history or tradition in Assam to support Tavernier's assertion. Mr. Gait further writes, "The use of fire-arms by the Ahoms dates from the close of this war (war with the Mahomedans under Turbak and Hosain Khan in 1533, in which the Mahomedans were defeated and a great number of cannon and matchlocks were captured by the Ahoms). Up to this time their weapons had consisted of swords, spears and bows and arrows."² It is possible that some of these captured guns were recaptured by Mir Jumla from the Ahoms during his invasion of Assam later on, and hence Tavernier's assertion.

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¹ Tavernier, *Travels in India*, 1678, Pt. II, Bk. III, p. 187 (quoted by Mr. Gait in his *History of Assam*).

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² Gait, *History of Assam*, p. 92.

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We would now describe some remarkable specimens of very big iron guns of the Moghul times still existing in different parts of India. Guns were cast in brass or made by welding pieces or rings of wrought iron. Laterly guns were made from cast iron as well, but it is difficult to say precisely when iron guns were first cast. It seems that cast-iron guns were introduced into India by the Europeans in the eighteenth century.

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up to the thirteenth century and zinc only found a place amongst the metals in *Madanpāla-Nirghaṇṭu*, and other alchemical works of the fourteenth century and later. I am afraid Prof Benoy Kumar Sarkar in his "Hindu Sociology" has laboured in vain to explain away the arguments adduced above, which jointly show that the work could not have existed in its present form before the sixteenth century. Moreover Prof. Sarkar has conveniently forgotten to explain the frequent mention of guns and cannon in his eagerness to establish the antiquity of the "Sukra cycle of philosophers."

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*Bengal guns*: There are many big iron guns of the Moghul times in many parts of Bengal, notably in Dacca, Murshidābād, Bishnupur, Bhāgulpur and other places. Rennel in his celebrated "Memoir of a map of Hindoostan" has described a gigantic wrought-iron gun he found at Dacca in the eighteenth century. He writes: "There are the remains of a very strong fortress in it; and within these few years there was near it a cannon of extra-ordinary weight and dimensions: but it has since fallen into the river, together with the bank on which it rested."¹ Rennel took the measurements of the gun very carefully, which are given below:—

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¹ Rennel's "Memoir of a Map of Hindoostan," third edition, 1793, p. 61.

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| Whole length | .. | 22 feet | 10½ inches. |
| Diameter at the breech | .. | 3 ,, | 3 ,, |
| ,, 4 feet from the muzzle | 2 ,, | 10 ,, | |
| ,, of the muzzle | 2 ,, | 2½ ,, | |
| ,, of the bore | 1 ,, | 3⅛ ,, | |

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He says, "it was made of hammered iron; it being an immense tube formed of 14 bars, with rings of 2 or 3 inches wide driven over them, and hammered down into a smooth surface, so that its appearance was equal to that of the best executed piece of brass ordnance, although its proportions were faulty. The gun contained 234,413 cubic inches of wrought iron and consequently weighed 64,814 pounds avoirdupois, or about the weight of eleven 32-pounders. Weight of an iron shot from the gun, 465 pounds." Local tradition names the gun as *Kāley Khān*, a gun of that name being mentioned by the Venetian traveller Manucci in the list of big cannon possessed by the great Moghul in the seventeenth century.²

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² Manucci, History of the Moghuls (Irvine's translation), 1653-1708, Vol. II, p. 365.

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A smaller iron gun still exists at Dacca which was constructed at the same time as the bigger one. Mr. H. E. Stapleton took its measurements, the gun being 11 feet long and the diameter of its mouth 1 foot 7½ inches.

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The great iron gun at Murshidābād, called Jāhānkoshā (conqueror of the world), 17 feet 6 inches in length and with a circumference of 5 feet 3 inches, is of great historical importance owing to the existence of nine inscribed brass plates on it. From the inscription it is ascertained that this gun was constructed in 1047 Hijira, Jamadinssani (October, 1637), during the reign of Emperor Shājahān (the then Subādār of Bengal being Islām Khān) at Jahāngirnagar (Dacca) by chief mechanic Janārdan under the supervision of Darogā Sher Mahammad and Inspector Harabullava Dās.¹

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¹ Kaliprasanna Banerji, *History of Bengal* (in Bengalee), p. 521.

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Another inscribed big gun was presented in 1891 by Captain Petley, being dug up at False Point, to the Asiatic Society of Bengal, in whose rooms it has been preserved. Mr. C. R. Wilson from the inscription reads the date as [1] 584 Saka era or 1622 A.D., and says: "The gun was captured from Aurungzebe's General, Mir Jumla in 1662, by Svargadev Jayadhvaja Sinha, the then reigning Ahom Prince of Assam. From Assam it was carried away to Burma. It was taken by the English in the first Burmese War and on the completion of the light-house at False Point in 1838, it seems to have been removed from the old fort at Cuttack and buried in the ground near the light-house to hold a flag staff."² This gun was also manufactured in the same way as the Dacca guns from wrought iron. Mahamahopadhaya H. P. Shastri, who examined the gun, writes: "The gun is made in the old-fashioned method of welding together a number of large iron rings, three inches thick, with an opening in the middle with a diameter of three inches."³

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² C. R. Wilson's "Catalogue of Antiquities in the Asiatic Society of Bengal," p. 2. Gait (Report on Historical Research in Assam, 1896, p. 29) makes the date A.D. 1658, while H. P. Shastri makes it A.D. 1525, based evidently on a wrong reading of the inscription.

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³ Proceedings, Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1890, 167.

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Besides the above there are several old iron guns at Bishnupur in Bengal and several inscribed Assam guns of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries have been described by Mr. Rakhaldas Banerji.⁴ On one of these Assam guns there is a Persian inscription "taiyār shud" meaning "was manufactured" in contrast with "rekhta shud" or "was cast," the latter inscription occurring, according to Prof. Jadu Nath Sircar, on many other guns, [Figure: Iron Gun at Murshidābād. (Photograph by Johnston and Hoffmann, Calcutta.)]

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⁴ Journal, Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1909 and 1911.

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The Landa Kesab Gun at Bijapur. (The Empress, May, 1913, No 2, page 12.)

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presumably made of brass.¹ This inscription unmistakably shows that the Assam guns were really made from wrought iron.

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¹ I enquired from Prof. Jadunath Sircar if he had met with the Persian inscription "was cast" on any iron gun of the Moghul times. In reply Prof. Sircar informs me that the Moghul iron guns he has seen in Northern and Southern India were made of wrought iron.

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From the description of the guns in Bengal given above two facts come out very clearly:—

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(a) That in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries guns were manufactured in India by welding pieces or rings of wrought iron. The manufacture of a big iron gun, 21 feet long, by hammering and welding wrought iron, as described by Rennel, in such a manner that "its appearance was equal to that of the best executed piece of brass ordnance" unmistakably shows that Indians lost none of their old marvellous metallurgical skill which could produce at one time a Delhi or a Dhar pillar. This fact also shows that the production of wrought iron in India during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries still continued to be on a considerable scale.

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(b) From the inscription on the Murshidābād gun which was manufactured at Dacca we learn that the gun was constructed by a Hindu head-mechanic. That opens up an important subject. It seems that the Dacca, Murshidābād and Bishnupur guns were all manufactured by Hindu mechanics and metallurgists under the orders of the Mahomedan rulers. Mr. Lister² in the Presidential address to the Staffordshire Iron and Steel Institute says: "It was believed that the Mahomedans never made iron although acquainted with the higher arts in its use." It appears that the Hindus were skilled workers in iron in all ages and their remarkable skill was utilized by the Mahomedan rulers in the manufacture of wrought-iron guns which must be really regarded as specimens of Hindu art.

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² Iron and Coal Trades Review, Vol. LXXXIII, p. 561.

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*Bijāpur guns*: We have no space here to touch upon the smaller guns and would conclude with the description of several gigantic guns of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in other parts of India. There is a big 24 feet wrought-iron gun at Nurvar. On the south wall of the city of Bijāpur there is still to be seen the celebrated Landa Kesab gun. It is also made of circular iron rings shrunk on longitudinal iron bars and then welded together. Aurungzebe is credited to have removed the original points on which it turned in order to make it practically useless. It is 21 feet 7 inches long, diameter at the breech is 4 feet 4 inches, calibre 1 foot 7 inches, length of bore 18 feet 7 inches and the estimated weight 47 tons.

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The long gun, named the "farflier," which is said to have been raised on the huge tower known as the Haider Burj at Bijāpur by means of an inclined plane over a mile long, should be of interest in this connection. This gun, too, was constructed of iron bars of square section and laid longitudinally along the bore, over which rings were slipped, one at a time, while the last was red-hot. As they cooled they shrank and bound the iron bars together. The gun near the breech was strengthened by the addition of a second layer. It is 30 feet 8 inches long and has a bore 1 foot in diameter.

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The long gun at Gulburga seems to have been made in a similar way, but it is worthy of notice that there is double row of iron rings, ten on each side. It was doubtless by means of these the gun was conveyed from point to point, for there is no evidence of any pivot or other arrangement by which it could be moved.¹

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¹ The description of the Bijapur guns has been taken from an illustrated article in the "Empress," May, No. 2, 1904, pp. 12 and 13.

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We have given here photographs of three guns, viz. the Murshidābād gun, the Landa Kesab gun and the Gulbarga gun. It is unnecessary for our purpose to multiply the number of such photographs.

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It is not necessary here to refer to iron 'bundooks' or matchlocks except in a general manner. The *Ayeen Akbari*, which says that excepting Room (ancient Turkey) no kingdom could compare with the Indian Empire under the Moghuls in the number and variety of its ordnance, describes the details of manufacturing matchlocks from wrought iron which would be of some interest. "Bundooks are now made in such a manner that when filled with powder up to muzzle, there is no fear of their bursting. Formerly they never were of more than four folds of iron, and sometimes only of one, joined together by the two extremities of the breadth, and which were very dangerous. His Majesty [Figure: The Iron Gun at Gulburga. (The Empress, May, 1913, No. 2, page 12.)]

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(Emperor Akbar), after having the iron flattened, has it rolled up like a scroll of paper, but slantingly, and every fold is passed through the fire. There is also the following method : solid pieces of iron are properly tempered and then bored with an iron borer ; and three or four of these are joined together to form a bundook. In preparing the iron for bundooks half is lost in the fire." 1

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Innumerable matchlocks of the Moghul times can be seen in the treasure-houses of most of Native princes and influential Zemindars of India.

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From the ancient specimens of Indian iron described above the reader will easily see that the metallurgical skill of the ancient Hindus is writ large on the wonderful series of iron articles of all ages from prehistoric times down to the seventeenth century. The story of iron manufacture in ancient India is really wonderful and perhaps unique in the annals of metallurgy in the whole world.

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We give below a summary of the specimens of ancient Indian iron described above :—

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We bring to a close our history of ancient Indian iron specimens with the seventeenth century, as from the eighteenth century European nations began to assert more and more political supremacy over India, and European enterprise and commerce began gradually to supplant the indigenous industries. The scientific spirit of enquiry in India was gradually on the wane from the twelfth or thirteenth century, if not earlier, and by the seventeenth century was almost completely decadent, though old processes continued in the absence of foreign competition. On the other hand, after the gloom and torpor of the Middle Ages, Europe began to pulsate by the seventeenth century with a new spirit of scientific enquiry which increased in volume and intensity every year. This spirit began to permeate and influence manufacture and commerce in an ever-increasing measure, and within a century or two European manufacture almost completely supplanted Indian industries of almost every description. So far as the iron industry is concerned, the old processes continued, though on an infinitely smaller scale, and in fact still continue in many places even now, being relegated to the lowest and illiterate classes, until, as at present, iron of European manufacture completely dominates the Indian market.

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¹ Ayeen Akbari, Gladwin's Translation, Vol. I, p. 111.

Iron in Ancient India c6.s8: Iron Guns and Cannon

Iron Guns and Cannon

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