A culverin was initially an ancestor of the hand-held arquebus , but the term was later used to describe a type of medieval and Renaissance cannon . The word is derived from the antiquated "culuering" and the French couleuvrine (from couleuvre " grass snake ", following Latin : colubrinus , lit. 'of the nature of a snake'). From its origin as a hand-held weapon it was adapted for use as artillery by the French in the 15th century and for naval use by the English in the 16th century . The culverin as an artillery piece had a long smoothbore gun barrel with a relatively long range and flat trajectory , using solid round shot projectiles with high muzzle velocity .
12-463: The hand culverin consisted of a simple smoothbore metal tube, closed at one end except for a small touch hole designed to allow ignition of the gunpowder . The tube was attached to a wood or metal extension which could be held under the arm. It was loaded with gunpowder and lead bullets and fired by inserting a burning slow match into the touch hole. James IV of Scotland was an enthusiastic user of hand culverins in 1508. He held shooting matches in
24-414: A slow match ( matchlock ), a linstock or a flash pan ignited by some type of pyrite - ( wheellock ) or flint -based gunlock ( snaplock , snaphaunce , and flintlock ), which will initiate the combustion of the main gunpowder charge . Without touch hole, it would be nearly impossible to ignite the powder because the only otherwise access into the barrel is from the front via the muzzle , which
36-487: A gun was a method of temporarily disabling a cannon by hammering a barbed steel spike into the touch hole; this could be removed only with great difficulty. If a special spike was unavailable, spiking could be done by driving a bayonet into the touch-hole and breaking it off, to leave the blade's tip embedded. Guns could also be rendered useless by burning their wooden carriages or blowing off their trunnions . Count Friedrich Wilhelm von Bismarck , in his Lectures on
48-471: A modified percussion cap ( primer ) seated in a cavity at the back end of the cartridge case. Between the primer pocket and the case chamber are one or more apertures known as flash holes , which serves functionally as a touch hole inside the cartridge. In artillery , priming powder, a fuse , squib , or friction igniter is inserted into the touch hole to ensure ignition of the charge. The ignition might be achieved via striking or electrically. Spiking
60-415: Is obturated by the projectile . In the later caplock firearms, the ignition sparks are generated by a shock-sensitive percussion cap placed over a conical "nipple", which has a hollow conduit known as the flash channel , that leads into the barrel and serves the same function as the touch hole. In modern breechloading firearms, the propellant charge is packaged inside a cartridge , which has
72-413: The "bastard culverin" (4 inches; 100 mm), 7-pound (3.2 kg) shot and the " demi-culverin " or "culverin-moyen" ( 4 + 1 ⁄ 2 inches; 110 mm), 10-pound (4.5 kg) shot. Overall, the culverin was a significant advance over earlier cannons. Since it fired iron round shot instead of stone projectiles and had a longer barrel to enable the gunpowder to fully burn and impart more force to
84-521: The Tactics of Cavalry , recommended that every cavalry soldier carry the equipment needed to spike guns if an encounter with enemy artillery was expected. If a cannon were in danger of being captured by the enemy, its crew would spike the gun to prevent it from being used against them. Captured guns would be spiked if they could not be hauled away and the gun's recapture seemed likely. Explosive charge Too Many Requests If you report this error to
96-459: The great halls of Holyrood Palace and Stirling Castle , took a culverin to stalk deer in the park of Falkland Palace , and shot at sea birds from a row boat off the Isle of May with his culverin. In addition to the arquebus, the culverin also evolved into the heavier breech-loading swivel gun weighing around 40 kg (88 lb), which required a swivel for support and aiming. This weapon
108-505: The muzzle. In Britain , Brigadier General Michael Richards was appointed Master-General of the Ordnance in 1714 and he commissioned a Danish expert, Albert Borgard , to design a new artillery system. Borgard did away with the traditional nomenclature of culverins, sakers and minions , and devised a new system based on the weight of shot that each gun used, from 4 to 64 pounds . Although Borgard's gun designs were quickly superseded,
120-484: The practice of naming ordnance by weight of shot persisted in Britain into the 20th century. Touch hole A touch hole , also known as a cannon vent , is a small hole at the rear (breech) portion of the barrel of a muzzleloading gun or cannon . The hole provides external access of an ignition spark into the breech chamber of the barrel (where the combustion of the propellant occurs), either with
132-437: The projectile, the culverin could fire the denser projectile to a relatively greater range and with a flatter trajectory . A replica culverin extraordinary has achieved a muzzle velocity of 408 m/s (1,340 ft/s), and a range over 450 m (1,480 ft) using only minimal elevation. This velocity and mass imply that the cannonball had a kinetic energy of roughly 600 kilojoules (440,000 ft⋅lbf ) when leaving
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#1732780706043144-412: Was designed to use removable mug -shaped chambers which were prefilled with gunpowder and projectiles to speed up reloading. Breech-loading swivel guns were often used on ships against enemy crew or boarders . Three types of culverin artillery pieces were used, distinguished by their size: the "culverin extraordinary", the "ordinary", and the "least-sized". There were also smaller versions, including
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