Tanegashima Matchlock (Japanese Arquebus)

Timeline

1. 1543–1544Tanegashima · TanegashimaPortuguese merchants arrived on Tanegashima with arquebuses; lord Tanegashima Tokitaka ordered swordsmith Yaita Kanbei Kiyasada to copy them, giving Japan its first mass-producible European firearm, known in history as the "transmission of the teppō."
2. c. 1550–1582Japanese archipelago · JapanTeppō technology spread from Tanegashima to the Kinai region and daimyo across the land; Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi incorporated teppō units into their armies, developing volley fire and three-rank firing tactics. Around the battles of Nagashino and Honnō-ji, Japan's teppō production and use reached an unprecedented scale.
3. 1592–1598Korean Peninsula battlefields · Korean PeninsulaToyotomi's invasion army used teppō as its core infantry firepower, delivering intermittent volleys to suppress Korean and Ming forces during the landing at Busan, the siege of Pyongyang, and field battles elsewhere. Korea urgently copied and imported firearms in response, and the teppō became the decisive weapon of East Asian land warfare in the 1590s.