European Hand Cannon (Touch-hole Gun)

Timeline

1. c. 1360–1420Holy Roman Empire and France · Central EuropeIn the second half of the 14th century, iron- or copper-tube hand cannons began appearing in the equipment lists of the Holy Roman Empire, Italian city-states, and French armies. Early hand cannons required two operators, were inaccurate and slow to load, and were used mainly for city defence and close-range intimidation; their psychological effect often exceeded their lethality. Both English and French forces fielded a few hand cannons with their infantry during the Hundred Years' War.
2. 1453Constantinople · Byzantine EmpireIn 1453, Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II used artillery and hand cannons on a large scale in the siege, finally breaching the millennium-old walls and capturing Constantinople. This event, which shocked Europe, prompted Western European states to rapidly increase investment in firearms research and procurement. Within a few years after the war, the proportion of hand cannons in European armies rose markedly, marking the formal arrival of the firearms age in Europe.
3. 1453–1460Western and Central European states · Central EuropeIn the decade after the fall of Constantinople, military archives of France, Burgundy, England, Spain, and the Italian states all recorded rapid growth in hand cannon numbers. Around 1460, some city-states began establishing dedicated firearm detachments. Hand cannons gradually evolved from auxiliary weapons into independent combat units, providing the necessary technical accumulation for the maturation of pike-and-shot tactics in the early 16th century.