Largest Wheeled Cannon, Jaivana Cannon, Jaigarh Fort, Rajsthan, 20 feet long of Sawai Raja of Jaipur
Written by LONDON SWAMINATHAN
swami_48@yahoo.com
Date: 5 NOVEMBER 2019
Time in London – 18-42
Post No. 7182
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India is famous for its very big guns made up of iron, bronze and brass. India has the longest gun in Karnataka. The largest bronze gun is in Bijapur. Jaipur has the biggest gun with two wheels. We see big guns from 14h century. Who taught them to make such big guns? It is in ancient Sanskrit book called Sukra Niti. White people don’t want to give credit to India. So they said it was written after the guns came. As usual they placed cart before the horse!
Moghul emperor Aurangzeb had seventy guns mostly made up of brass. Some of these are so heavy and large and so they had to be drawn and moved about with the help of 20 yoke of oxen.
GREAT GUN OF AGRA
The story of the great gun of Agra is a sad story. Sitaram’s water colour painting shows that the unmounted huge gun lying in mud on the banks of river Jamuna. British Governor General Lord William Bentinck ordered to destroy it and sold it as scrap metal in 1833. It was a brass gun of 14 feet long and 22 inch in bore. A man could easily enter into it in a crouching position. Its weight was 1469 maunds.
Many of the Moghul brass guns were captured by the British and destroyed. It is written that 76 brass and 86 iron guns were seized at Agra by Lord Lake. 68 guns and mortars of brass, cast in India were also captured by him in Delhi. The British plundered India and used them for themselves or sent them to Britain.
MOST IMPORTANT GUN
According to Ferguson the largest piece of ordnance was the MALIK – I – MAIDAN GUN made up of bronze. It means Monarch of the Plain.Its composition was
80% copper and 20 % tin. Its length 14 feet 3 inches.
Diameter at mouth – 4 feet 10 inches. The muzzle is in the shape of a dragon. The manipulation and skill, involved in casting such a gigantic piece of bronze armament proves the skill of the workers in Ahmednagar in 1548.
Neogi in his book Copper in Ancient India lists other smaller guns as well.
P k Gode in his article ‘Use of Guns and Gun powder in India from 1400 onwards gives evidence for use of guns in that period. Mahun, a Chinese traveller , visiting Bengal in 1406 mentions that guns were used in Bengal.
In memoirs of Babar also we find that he used guns and gun powder near Kanauj in 1528
SUKRA NITI
Description of iron guns and cannons are found in the Sanskrit work SUKRA NITI written by Sukracharya. If guns are foreign inventions, he would not have written it in Sanskrit. Moreover his book was written before Muslim rule. Sukraniti describes two varieties of fire arms -Kshudra nalika , small guns and
Brihad nalikas, large guns. He gives detailed description of these guns.
In Yuktikalpataru , another Sanskrit work of the 11th century, we find a list of places where swords are manufactured. Benares, Magadha, Ceylon, Nepal, Anga, Mysore, Surat and Kalinga are mentioned by the author.
Sarangadhara Paddhati , another Sanskrit work of 14th century, also gives the manufacturing towns-
Khatikattara,Rishi, Banga, Shurporaka,Videha,Anga
Madhyama grama, Bedidesha, Sahagram,Kalinjar.
LONGEST CANNON
The longest cannon is in Kalaburagi Fort in Karnataka. It is 29 feet long and was made during the Bahamani rule in the 14th century.(New Indian Express reported it in 2016)
IN TAMIL NADU
2000 year old Tamil Sangam literature also mentioned shiny swords. Poetess Avvaiyar warned one king in a satirical poem, that your palace armoury has shiny swords and your enemy’s armoury has swords that are second hand, unpolished, used swords. She hinted to the king that you are inexperienced in war with newly manufactured arms where as the other one has great experience in warfare.
Famous Guns of India
Following are the famous guns of Moghul Emperors scattered all over India:-
Their weights range between 30 and 47 tons;
The maximum length found was 31 feet;
Longest bore reaches about 1 feet 7 inches in diameter;
They are made up of iron;
Dacca , now in Bangladesh, had a gigantic gun weighing 30 tons. The weight of the iron ball used in it was 465 pounds. It has fallen into the river and disappeared. Venetian traveller Manucci mentioned it under the name ‘Kaley khan’.
There is a gun at Murshidabad, named
‘Jahan kosha’, meaning conqueror of the world, it has a length of 17-6 feet. Circumference 5-3 feet.
‘Landa kesab’ gun in Bijapur was 21 feet 7 inch long; the weight of the gun is estimated to be 47 tons. In the same town another gun called ‘Farflier’ was 30 feet long.
Finally mention made here of the long gun of Gulbarga . It has got a double row of iron rings , ten on each side, by means of which the gun was possibly conveyed from one place to another.
–source book (with my inputs)
History of Chemistry in Ancient and Medieval India
P Ry, 1956
–subham–
Tamil and Vedas 