Who found the Gunpowder in Europe.
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Gen. Erwin Rommel
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Who found the Gunpowder in Europe.
I heard the Gunpowder was first created in China, but i heard on History Channel that it was a German Monk who found it in Europe, i dont know if this is true, and i would apreciate any help with this.
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Sector 7s FFI
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Sector 7s FFI
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David Lehmann
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The powder developped by the chinese was not explosive but rather burned with a sudden combustion. It was mainly used in fireworks and later found useful in the military area but rather used in incendiary purposes, not explosive ones. At the same time Indians discovered more or less the same thing.
At the end of the VIIth century this invention (saltpeter only in fact) reached Western world in form of the Greek fire used (inventor : Kallinikos 673) and the Byzantine Empire. During the XIIIth century the arabs (commercily linked to the chinese at that time) used saltpeter too but unlike the Greeks not mainly in naval warfare but also more commonly in ground warfare.
In 1230 in "Liber Ignum" (The Book of Fire), Marcus Graecus (don't really know who he was) describes Saltpeter and gun powder (but not by that name). "Liber Ignum" mentions both propulsive uses, as in rockets, and explosive uses, as in guns. This work is probably an adaptation of an Arabic work of the time that made its way into the "Roman" world via Contantinople and the Crusades. This is the first real appearance of gunpowder (not only saltpeter) in the Western world I guess.
Later during the XIIIth century both Sir Francis Bacon, an Englishman, and Albert Le Grand, a German who worked a lot in Paris in France, published directions to make gunpowder. That's grossly what I know about the issue and the introduction of gunpowder in Europe.
Later in History many modifications, ameliorations, inspirations etc. were made with gunpowder (like the corning for example) and other explosive derivatives by many scientists like Joseph Proust (France), Berthollet (France), Fontaine (France), Abel (France), Dessignole (France), Brugère (France), Sobrero (Italy) and Alfred Nobel (Sweden) who invented nitroglycerine (nice for the Noble Prize
!) and Paul Vieille (France) etc. until the end of the XIXth century.
David
At the end of the VIIth century this invention (saltpeter only in fact) reached Western world in form of the Greek fire used (inventor : Kallinikos 673) and the Byzantine Empire. During the XIIIth century the arabs (commercily linked to the chinese at that time) used saltpeter too but unlike the Greeks not mainly in naval warfare but also more commonly in ground warfare.
In 1230 in "Liber Ignum" (The Book of Fire), Marcus Graecus (don't really know who he was) describes Saltpeter and gun powder (but not by that name). "Liber Ignum" mentions both propulsive uses, as in rockets, and explosive uses, as in guns. This work is probably an adaptation of an Arabic work of the time that made its way into the "Roman" world via Contantinople and the Crusades. This is the first real appearance of gunpowder (not only saltpeter) in the Western world I guess.
Later during the XIIIth century both Sir Francis Bacon, an Englishman, and Albert Le Grand, a German who worked a lot in Paris in France, published directions to make gunpowder. That's grossly what I know about the issue and the introduction of gunpowder in Europe.
Later in History many modifications, ameliorations, inspirations etc. were made with gunpowder (like the corning for example) and other explosive derivatives by many scientists like Joseph Proust (France), Berthollet (France), Fontaine (France), Abel (France), Dessignole (France), Brugère (France), Sobrero (Italy) and Alfred Nobel (Sweden) who invented nitroglycerine (nice for the Noble Prize
!) and Paul Vieille (France) etc. until the end of the XIXth century.David