There’s a cartoon floating around online called “The Invention of Archery.” Three guys are standing beside each other. The first guy says I want to stab that guy, but he’s way over there.
Firearms were likely dreamt up along the same lines. Someone hit upon the idea that black-powder stuffed down a tube, topped with a projectile and touched off with fire, did spectacular damage downrange. Man, I want to knock that castle down, but it’s way over there.
In Europe, cannons showed up in Italy around 1320. For the next 200 years, firearms were essentially hand cannons—short, stout barrels loaded with blackpowder, then packed with rocks, pebbles and sometimes arrows. You jabbed a hole in the barrel’s top or side with a smoldering stick or hot iron. Firing it was a two-person job. One soldier would hold the hand cannon (while presumably saying his prayers), and a second would grace the touch hole with the red poker. Anyone who’s seen a small wheel-mounted cannon go off—the type that shoots golf balls and is popular at sportsmen’s clubs in the country on chicken barbeque weekends—can imagine the thrill of holding such a device under one’s arm. Hand cannons weren’t particularly safe or accurate, but when they worked, lookout.
By the 15th century, the matchlock came along. A lever, and later a trigger, was added under the barrel. When pulled, the “lock” dropped a lit could have taken several seconds to go off.
