I had originally posted this answer in a thread by a user who has since deleted their account, which unfortunately renders the original thread unsearchable. It's still up on my profile, but it's being reposted here for good measure.

Original question:

##How prevalent was China's use of gunpowder before 1000?

I recently came across an old archived post claiming that China's claim to the use of gunpowder is exaggerated. (https://web.archive.org/web/20121008093433/http://www.musketeer.ch/blackpowder/history.html) The author cites their use of catapults, Marco Polo's failing to mention their use, the lack of specifics as to where one can find the original sources of these claims. I am not particularly well versed in Chinese history, so I wanted to ask how these claims stacked up? How prevalent was the use of gunpowder in China before they began interacting with the west?

So I felt tempted to say that the author's talking out of his backside, but that seems overly generous. There's plenty of research, some quite old, into the development of gunpowder in China, some of which is more available than others. Vol. 5, Part 7 of Joseph Needham's Science and Civilization in China from 1987 is all about gunpowder, though it's comparatively hard to get your hands on except via a library or via archive.org. Personally, I recommend Tonio Andrade's more recent book, The Gunpowder Age (2016), which is more up-to-date and gives a clear and concise overview of the development of gunpowder technology with a focus on China and Western Europe. While it's true that original documents are going to be hard to find and hard to develop the skills to read, these two volumes should include plenty in translation (and much artistic and archaeological evidence) for you to pore over. As for the linked website, well...

The author cites Marco Polo uncritically, especially the most controversial parts of his narrative. In particular, he claims that Polo was governor of Jiangnan for 17 years (even Polo himself doesn't say that, rather that he was governor of Yangzhou for three years, which is itself a fabrication.) Crucially for us, he regurgitates Marco Polo's claim to have been asked to build catapults to help conclude the siege of the Song city of Xiangyang.

Conclusion: Do you really think, dear reader, the Polos would have built catapults if the Khan had known about black powder, supposedly invented 400 years before?

Yes. Yes I would.

Let's walk through this.

It does not follow that the discovery of gunpowder leads to the invention of guns. Simply put, the idea of using a metal tube to constrain a gunpowder charge's explosive effect and concentrate it on a projectile is easier said than done. Metallurgical techniques need to be refined; the necessity of such devices needs to be perceived; and there is naturally some random chance involved in someone stumbling upon and successfully implementing the concept. Instead, for a couple of hundred years gunpowder was mainly used in self-contained explosive devices: bombs, rockets and fire-lances (essentially powder-filled bamboo tubes suspended on long poles). The lattermost item was primarily an anti-personnel weapon, and it was from the latter concept that the gun emerged in China. Later fire-lances suspended shards of metal or porcelain around the bamboo tube, operating on the principle of fragmentation grenades. During the thirteenth century, the bamboo tubes evolved into metal ones, designed to be reusable and launch projectiles at a distance, rather than being single-use pieces for exploding in the midst of the enemy.

The exact date of early examples is hard to verify. The oldest definitively dated conventional firearm – defined here as a roughly tubular metal implement designed to launch a projectile by igniting gunpowder behind it – is the so-called 'Xanadu Gun' from 1298, not much long after Polo, leading many to suggest the advent of metal guns around 1280. However, we do have one example of a weapon found in Gansu, a bronze tube containing a powder charge and an iron projectile (!) (you can tell this is really fascinating stuff), which is not marked with any dating on its own, but was found alongside artifacts of the Tangut Western Xia Dynasty, potentially dating it between 1214 and 1227! So no, we have clear archaeological evidence of 13th century hand-guns.

But even without guns, the fact is that the amount of gunpowder in use by 1280 was vast. Yangzhou's arsenal exploded that year, creating an explosion heard thirty miles away. Polo does not mention it, but as noted above, Polo's posting in Yangzhou (if he indeed had one) had terminated by 1278. Now, you asked for pre-1000, and while the archaeological evidence doesn't exist (unsurprising given that the weapons that gunpowder was employed in were decidedly single-use), there is plenty of scattered textual evidence from the late Tang, Northern and Southern and early Song periods that affirms the use of gunpowder. In 904, Yang Xingmi is said to have used an incendiary-launching machine to set fire to the Longsha Gatehouse in Yuzhang, which could potentially indicate the use of catapult-launched bombs or of gunpowder arrows. More definitively, the Song court eagerly entertained demonstrations of bombs and explosive arrows, with recorded cases in 970, 1000 and 1002, in the lattermost case prompting orders for widespread introduction of the demonstrated weapons. A quantified assessment of the amount of gunpowder in use is basically impossible, but needless to say that by the arrival of the Mongols, various explosive devices were already in widespread use.

The fundamental issue concerns the website author's failure to actually contextualise Polo, and his consequent uncritical view of the absolute supremacy of his journals as a source. For one, Polo is almost certain not to have been involved in the Siege of Xiangyang, because the Chinese sources all agree that it had concluded in 1273, two years before Polo reached Khanbaliq. For another, Polo's Europe was pre-gun. The first references to guns in Europe date from the 1320s. These include a Florentine decree from 1326 calling for the manufacture of guns, and an illustration of a simple arrow-launching cannon in Walter de Milemete's De Nobilitatibus from the same year. Polo himself would not have known what a cannon was. Indeed, there is virtually no evidence that anyone in Europe before 1320 knew what gunpowder was, inconclusive speculation about some use of it at the Battle of Mohi in Hungary in 1241 notwitstanding. Hence, perhaps, why most European languages specifically associate black powder with cannons or shooting (En. gunpowder, Fr. poudre à canon, Ge. Schießpulver 'shooting powder', It. polvere da sparo 'powder of shot'), as the two may have come hand in hand. Polo wouldn't have been contracted to produce cannons because he wouldn't have even known what they were.

If we actually look at how gunpowder was used in the 1280s, Polo being asked to build catapults makes complete sense. As said earlier, prototype guns were derived from anti-personnel weapons, and were very much light pieces of kit themselves. The Xanadu gun is 35 cm (14") long, and weighs six kilograms (~13 lb); a small hand-gun found near the Gansu cannon weighs 1.5 kg (~3.3 lb); and although the main Gansu gun weighs 108 kg (~240 lb) and has a barrel diameter of 12cm (4.5in), which is certainly substantial (its calibre is comparable to the 12-pounder 'Napoleon' of the US Civil War), it is still more of an anti-personnel calibre than the siege bombards we typically associate early cannon with, and moreover the gun on the whole is quite short, suggesting it was designed for short-range anti-personnel fire (likely using grapeshot or other small projectiles) rather than long-range bombardment of structures. Guns were not wall-demolishing weapons, nor necessarily were catapults. But catapults can reliably fling bombs and incendiaries, making them infinitely more useful as a siege weapon before guns could do the same.

Indeed, the great engagements of Zhu Yuanzhang's campaigns against the Mongols, such as the naval battle on Poyang Lake in 1363 and the siege of Suzhou in 1366, affirm that into the fourteenth century, gunpowder's primary purpose was in incendiary and anti-personnel weapons, not heavy wall-destroyers. The very heaviest cannon of Zhu's fleet at Poyang Lake weighed no more than 75kg, and descriptions of the battle place guns alongside a plethora of various weapons, while at Suzhou the breaching of the gates was likely done by manual battery, not machinery. Why this was is a different question, but needless to say the website author is much mistaken in his conception of the employment of gunpowder.

[Continued below]

Week 102

 

Newly appointed Prime Minister F.S. Nitti walked into the Italian Chamber on July 9^th 1919 – the reopening day, after the vote of no confidence to V.E. Orlando on June 19^th – with a well established plan: a carefully composed speech, addressing the main social, financial and political issues of the time, pieces of legislation already introduced or ready to be announced in order to provide an immediate follow up to his exposition, and a long term design of national pacification, building up to that collective industrious effort necessary to bring production, and henceforth society, up to the standards of the modern democratic nations.

A lofty ambition, of very dubious outcome. Since not only the material, economical, social and psychological circumstances were – at the same time – quite unfavorable for such a momentous transformation and actively demanding it; but Nitti's own direction had to confront not only the material, economical facts, but also a sentimental, “national” and a practical, “financial” opposition to his designs, both quite difficult to win over.

We find – Nitti begun, after reading his list of Ministries and Undersecretaries – a program defined by present needs we can't avoid, with set boundaries we can't escape. […] Four fundamental points must determine our action:

1. To see through the negotiations concerning peace, with a sincere and loyal defense of our program of national aspirations. 2) To accomplish as soon as possible the transition from the state of war to that of peace, abolishing all those things that war had made necessary and peace makes superfluous, and therefore damaging. 3) To make the living conditions less difficult for the people and to pursue a vigorous policy of prices, in absence of which it is impossible to ensure social peace. 4) To ready in a timely manner the economical and financial regulations that the new situation requires.

For the realization of this program, one condition is necessary above anything else: the maintenance of public order against any perturbing attempt, from whatever part it may come. […] We'll be as much stronger abroad when it is clear that those who represent us are representing not a country unsure of her means and of her goals, but the great soul of the Nation. And within, we'll be able to accomplish our reforms more rapidly and more rapidly to rebuild a normal life, as the conditions of order, safety and social peace are secured. […]

 

Obvious as the appeal to order and social peace can be, much less obvious are the means to achieve such ends – indeed, those devised and represented by Nitti had been met with a significant opposition since before the days of his Ministerial ascension. Indeed the practical handling of public order will remain a thorn in Nitti's side – more so after the elections of November 1919 – with recurrent accusations of being too lenient and too tolerant towards the socialist initiatives (and favoring the access to credit of the socialist administrations), in an effort to garner some measure of support for his Ministry. An impression that, even when skewed by political considerations, did eventually produce a sentiment of the ineffectiveness of the State and of the mishandling of public force.

As discussed thoroughly by Vivarelli, a more coherent and energetic effort in this direction might have helped prevent that fracture between the public force, especially on local ground, and the central government which became apparent during the rise and affirmation of Fascism. At the same time, Nitti's attempts to adopt energetic measures were usually met with strong opposition and, at times, discouraged by the authorities themselves. More so, while it appears that Nitti was, by personal disposition and belief, more inclined to see a true danger in the passive (or active) resistance of the public administration, military and police, than in the recurrent “political” unrest promoted by the socialist movement, it's also fairly dubious that a change of pace in this direction would have earned him some degree of support from the “national” forces – or at least some larger degree than the “tolerant” opposition of the liberal-conservatives and national-moderates he had secured with the inclusion of Tittoni and Scialoja. A fact which also goes to show that his handling of the “national” opposition relied for the most part in a positive resolution of the Adriatic question, while taking advantage of the ongoing dissolution of the Fascio Parlamentare during the preparations for new elections; relying on the other hand on the satisfaction of certain aspirations of the popular movements for the purpose of earning the support of the Popolari and possibly of the Socialist Reformers.

This balancing act – not an unprecedented one in Italian politics, and something that could become somewhat easier, as far as Ministerial stability went, once it was clear that no practical Government alternative existed – was, given the present circumstances, a rather complex endeavor. Since, while the difficulty in producing a satisfactory “national” solution of the Adriatic problem was destined, if not to alienate (that Nitti hoped most of them would eventually regain hold of their senses) at least to offer a convenient weak spot for the attacks of the “national” oppositions, the critical financial situation of the State made it extremely hard, or at least extremely costly, to introduce measures destined to contain public dissatisfaction and to effectively ease the living conditions of the lower classes. A situation that was to become a constant of post war Italy, until a general improvement of international trade and credit climate in late 1921 early 1922 followed the Italian recessive slump which had already somewhat eased the inflation burden. In the meantime, as D. Forsyth summarizes,

It is difficult to see how liberal leaders could have won the allegiance of the mass political parties, while pursuing orthodox monetary and financial policies, however necessary they felt the latter to have been.

Outside of these more concrete considerations, any attempt to appeal to the liberal-national forces, to those opposition groups “who don't really feel against the government” - as Nitti himself described them after his winning his confidence vote on July 14^th in a telegram to Tittoni – had to face the reality that, being those groups tied to the galaxy of the national right, they couldn't really abstract from the fact that the “national” opposition, in its reduced ranks, had coalesced around a platform which was fervently and completely opposed to Nitti's political designs.

As Alfredo Codacci-Pisanelli, of Salandra's national right, explained in his long, meandering diatribe against the Ministry – made even longer by the constant bickering with Enrico Ferri – on July 10^th 1919, Nitti represented “the most advanced American machinery ever brought to the Italian political scene”, something in between Tammany Hall and the Standard Oil Company.

Hon. Nitti, your conceit of the Italian public life can certainly pride itself of being modern, and looking from that side of things perhaps even perfect: but this conceit of Italian public life is, both for the past, and for the present, and for the future, so much different and so much the opposite of the one I wish to see restored, that my deep, absolute opposition is only confirmed […] by a direct comparison [of the two].

You hold our political tradition in little esteem, you love and make large practice of compromises […] You fail to earn our trust because of the way you pass judgment and feel about our most precious traditions, you fail to earn our trust because of the way you have accomplished your functions in this political field, you fail to earn our trust because of the way you have begun your government action. […]

And on more practical terms,

Hon. Nitti, from the reciprocal political attitude between you and the Socialists, I must conclude that you regard these current allies of yours as people not to be feared, and to be led as you think better. Without any opposition from you, many local and communal authorities are entrusting a more or less conspicuous portion of their public powers to socialist organizations and corporations, which aren't certainly deaf to the advice of their representative comrades […] If you regarded them as a threat, you would certainly not do so. And you would certainly not hold your place to surrender the powers entrusted to you to a political enemy. […]

On the other hand, Nitti appeared more concerned with the threat of “a pronunciation” - that is a military subversive action, rumors of which had been circulating since before the fall of Orlando. This was, for Codacci Pisanelli, pure nonsense as the “tradition” and “honor” of the Italian military, their loyalty to the institutions, prevented any such eventuality.

If such a, very unlikely, pronunciation is disgraceful and disastrous. No less disgraceful and disastrous […] is Bolshevism. Which would represent the dissolution of the modern unitary state […]