History of gunpowder: Fireworks
Who invented gunpowder?
Like the idea of zero, gunpowder developed gradually over time.
In 142 AD, during the Han Dynasty, a man named Wei Boyang was the first to write anything about gunpowder. He wrote about a mixture of three powders that would “fly and dance” violently.
We aren’t sure that he meant gunpowder, but that’s the only explosive that uses three ingredients that we know of. He may have been a Taoist trying to find a potion to let you live forever.
More about Taoism
More about Chinese science
Lots of Ancient China articles
Ingredients of gunpowder
Gunpowder ingredients: Sulphur rocks
By 300 AD, a Jin dynasty scientist named Ge Hong had certainly written down the ingredients of gunpowder and described the explosion. Scientists made gunpowder in ancient China by mixing sulfur, charcoal, and saltpeter, or potassium nitrate.
It probably wasn’t hard to think of mixing these three things. All three components of gunpowder were common in ancient China. Probably chemists were just mixing together a lot of things they had handy, to see what they would do.
Sulphur: You got sulphur by mining it out of the ground, where it exists naturally as a yellowish rock.
More about sulphur
Charcoal: You got charcoal by burning wood very slowly, so that it blackened into carbon without burning completely.
More about how to make charcoal
Gunpowder ingredients: Charcoal
Saltpeter: You could make potassium nitrate, or saltpeter, by taking animal manure and letting it sit around for a while and decay. Then potassium nitrate crystals formed in the manure, and you could drain them off by washing water through the manure pile.
Saltpeter also occurs naturally inside some caves, and you can just go to those caves and mine saltpeter there.
How is gunpowder made?
You made gunpowder by mixing the three powders together, using about fifteen parts of saltpeter to three parts of charcoal and two parts of sulphur.
Gunpowder ingredients: Saltpeter crystals growing
The reason gunpowder explodes is that this mixture burns very fast. When it burns, it releases gases that are bigger in volume than the original powder (just the way steam is bigger than water is).
More about steam
Gunpowder and fireworks
But even though scientists like Ge Hong knew how to make gunpowder, and they knew that it would explode, they didn’t have any particular use for gunpowder. For hundreds of years, nobody did use gunpowder much. Slowly people in China started to use gunpowder as fireworks, to make an exciting evening at a big party or for a religious festival.
More about Chinese New Year
Gunpowder as a weapon
Need a Halloween costume? Go as a Chinese lady! Or click here for lots more costume ideas!
Two hundred years later, in 904 AD, Chinese inventors saw that you could also use gunpowder as a weapon. First the army used fire arrows and fire spears. That’s basically like attaching a firecracker to the end of a spear or an arrow, so it will burn people.
More about the T’ang Dynasty
Earliest picture of a fire-spear, the earliest kind of gun (Dunhuang Caves, 900s AD)
What was the first army to use gunpowder?
The first (possible) recorded use of gunpowder in an actual battle was in the last days of China’s T’ang Dynasty, in 904 AD. That’s when the Southern Wu’s ruler, Prince Yang Xingmi, may have used fire arrows against Du Hong in the siege of Wuchang, in southern China.
The first cannons and guns
Earliest image of a cannon: A hand cannon firing a ball. The ball is missing now, but you can see where it once was. (Dazu Rock carvings, near Chengdu in central China, 1128 AD)
Soon after the use of fire spears, Chinese armies made the next big step. They used gunpowder in the form of rockets. They put small stone cannonballs inside bamboo tubes and shot the cannonballs out by lighting gunpowder at one end. This is the same idea that makes guns and cannons work today.
More about equal and opposite forces
First army to use cannons
Nobody knows exactly who was the first to use cannons in war. The first picture of a cannon is from 1128 AD, under the Song Dynasty. Cannons may have existed for a while before that.
The first battle where we know someone used cannons was in 1287, when Yuan Dynasty (Mongol) generals used them to end the Mongol Nayan’s rebellion. The Mongol army also used gunpowder bombs when it was trying to invade Japan in 1281 AD. Soon after that, scientists in Japan started to experiment with gunpowder weapons too.
More about the Mongols and the Yuan Dynasty
Other uses of gunpowder
By this time, Chinese engineers probably also used gunpowder to blast rocks away to make roads and canals. They seem to have used gunpowder in underground mines, to break the rock loose so miners could go in and gather up the loose pieces. Probably they also used gunpowder in stone quarries, to break loose pieces of stone.
More about the history of mining in China
History of gunpowder: A small bronze cannon from Gansu (about 1220 AD)
Gunpowder leaves China
The Chinese emperors tried to keep gunpowder as a secret weapon, but by the 1100s AD their secret had gotten out, and people in the Islamic Empire and then the Roman Empire started to understand how to use gunpowder for weapons.
After that, it wasn’t long before people in Europe also learned how to use gunpowder. Nobody is sure exactly how they found out, but it might have something to do with the Third Crusade.
More about the Third Crusade
History of gunpowder: Earliest image of a European gun (1326). The gun shoots arrows.
By 1216 AD, a monk named Roger Bacon in England described gunpowder as a weapon. He thought of it as something that came from foreign places.
More about Roger Bacon
By the 1300s, Europeans were starting to use cannons regularly in wars. Cannons played a big part in the Hundred Years’ War between England and France.
About the same time, Europeans also started to use gunpowder for blasting roads, and in mines, just the same way that people did in China.
More about medieval warfare
History of gunpowder and European colonization
Unfortunately for the people of West Africa, they hadn’t heard about gunpowder yet when European people attacked them in the 1400s AD, which is one reason why the Europeans were able to defeat them.
More about European colonization
Since that time, guns have killed a lot of people. Quatr.us does not in any way support the use of guns for any purpose. Fireworks are very pretty, though!
Did you find out what you wanted to know about the history of gunpowder? Let us know in the comments.
Learn by doing: go see a fireworks show
Chinese Science
Or Chinese Mathematics
Chinese Astronomy
Bibliography and further reading about Chinese science:
See also Joseph Needham, Science and Civilization in China, 5-7 (Cambridge University Press, 1987).
Where was it made?
The first gunpowder was made in the unofficial labs in the homes of rich families where someone was experimenting. Later on, it was made in government factories.
how much did gunpowder cost in ancient china I need to know for my chinese inventions project and for some reason i can´t see my comments so sorry if I keep posting the same thing
Hi! Sorry, comments don’t appear until I get a chance to approve them, to keep people from posting insults and bad words. It’s hard to say what gunpowder cost in Ancient China because there’s no easy way to compare our money with their money. But I think that for many years it probably wasn’t for sale: you had to buy the ingredients and mix them yourself. None of the ingredients were expensive, though, so I don’t think this would have been a big problem for anyone.
compared to the USD
who published the site?
The publisher is Quatr.us Study Guides; you’ll find a suggested citation format at the end of the article.
Was gun powder really popular??
Well, fireworks were very popular, and gunpowder was moderately useful in winning wars, so it was popular with soldiers. Gunpowder was also useful for loosening rock in mines. But in their daily lives, most people in antiquity didn’t need gunpowder, any more than you do.
thanks this helps my Chinese invention report
i agree, its very useful
CHINA!!
YOUR CHINA BOI 😑😑😑
wassup
HELP’
hi folks sheles and blokes how is every one garn well. hope all is well peace in the middle east
By “Quatr.us does not in any way support the use of guns for any purpose” do you mean you are against the use of guns?
Yes, that’s what I mean.
I don’t remember any cannons in Braveheart
brilliant thank you for the help
Wow! I didn’t know that fireworks were invented in 142 AD!!!!!!
Could i survive snorting gunpowder
Don’t do it. Modern gunpowder isn’t the same as ancient black powder anyway.
gday hows every body doing
china man know stuff
And Chinese women, too.
Can I ask you some questions?
Of course, that’s what I’m here for!
Hi, I was wondering if gunpowder was ever used as a threat.
Well, I mean, people use guns as a threat all the time? Do you mean before they invented guns? Before they invented guns, they used gunpowder for fire-spears for a while, and I suppose they might have used those to threaten people. But no, I don’t think people used gunpowder on its own to threaten people. It’s probably too hard to control without a gun or fire-spear.
Do you know specifically which alchemist accidentally invented gunpowder?
Their names are in the article. There’s absolutely no reason to think the discovery was accidental, though, unless you count all chemistry experiments as accidental. They were mixing different things to find out what would happen, and this was interesting so they wrote it down.
Hi I need more infor please and thank you
Hi! You might try reading this article: https://quatr.us/modern-europe/european-warfare-military-history.htm
Hello ‘^’
hi
didn’t they have explosive arrows as well that had a capsule filled with gunpowder at the end? (not sure if they were time bombs or exploded on contact)
Yes, before there were guns, there were flaming arrows that used gunpowder. But no, I don’t think they had ones that exploded on contact. For that you would need timers, or fuses with pressure ignition, and they didn’t have either of those.
[…] [4] History of Gunpowder: Gunpowder in ancient China. Karen Carr. Last modified June 7, 2017. https://quatr.us/china/gunpowder-ancient-china.htm. […]
Hi Karen, this is a great article. Gives a very good overview of gunpowder, it’s history and it’s evolution .
How many people knew the formula through the ages? I mean was it only a few scientists who knew until recent ages, or was it generel knowledge? Thanks in advance
Well, most people – by far the majority of people – have no idea how to make gunpowder even today. We generally underestimate how specialized information was even as far back as the Stone Age: most people probably didn’t know how to make a stone arrowhead; that was for flint-knappers. By the time gunpowder was invented, it took a specialist to use an up-to-date loom, or make paper, or smelt iron, or mine salt, or many other things. So gunpowder was another one of those things that only specialists knew how to do. Not just a few scientists, but not the general public either.
wassup people
As a year seven student (Australia) this was a very helpful source for my presentation on gunpowder in Ancient China. Thank you!
How did gunpowder spread throughout the world?
Nobody knows exactly how gunpowder got from China to the rest of Asia and to Europe, but presumably people who knew how to make it traveled, and told people, or else people from India and the Islamic world travelled to China and worked with manufacturers there. We know more about how gunpowder reached Africa, Australia, and the Americas (because that happened more recently): Europeans who went to those places brought guns and gunpowder with them, and eventually they started factories in those places to make gunpowder there. In North America, for example, the US government started making more gunpowder to use in fighting the American Revolution. (https://allthingsliberty.com/2013/09/the-gunpowder-shortage/)
Do we use the same gunpowder as the ancient Chinese did
Well, their gunpowder would still work just the same way, and some people do use it for historical re-enactments. But no, the gunpowder in bullets you might buy in a gun store today would have a slightly different mix of chemicals in it. Today’s gunpowder (also called “smokeless gunpowder”) is made of nitrocellulose, nitroglycerine, and petroleum jelly. It’s harder to make, but less smoky.
Hello
The Tang dynasty actually made tictacs and minecraft
Well, they had recently gotten sugar so they probably were making candy, but they really didn’t have computers. They played other types of games – you can read about them here: https://quatr.us/china/ancient-chinese-games-board-games-martial-arts.htm
hi
Your bio says you hold a doctorate in Classical Art and Archeology, I am wondering what your doctoral thesis was and where you were involved in archeology. I am a seventh grade teacher working with the age of exploration, but I will also have a lot of Chinese students joining my class this year and would like to increase my scope. Marco Polo and Zheng He are on my list!
Wonderful! We have lots of articles about Ming Dynasty China and the Columbian Exchange: if I were you, I’d emphasize the huge changes that the Age of Exploration brought even to people who never left home, in the form of new foods, for example: https://quatr.us/food-2/food-qing-dynasty-china.htm
I wrote my thesis on what effect the fall of Rome had on ordinary small farmers in southern Spain – the answer is, it was pretty hard on them. I have excavated in Greece, Cyprus, Britain, and Israel, but mainly in Tunisia, at Leptiminus, where I worked on analysis of the Roman pottery.
Thx this helped so much on my report!!
hi
Your website really help understand the making of gunpowder
hi
Hello Karen, I was wondering what date this article was published and what company runs the site.
Hi David, Thanks for stopping by! The citation information is at the bottom of each article (above this comment section). The publisher is Quatr.us Study Guides.
Dear Karen Carr
am very grateful for this website, is there any think i can do for you as thanks for this website
from Australian Myths, St Francis High School
I’m glad you like it! There certainly is something you can do: encourage your teachers, or your school librarian, to link to Quatr.us Study Guides so other students will be able to find us! That would be a tremendous help to us.
Dear Karen Carr
am doing an information report on your website and you, but I need some information
>when did you first start in the department of history
>how long have you been in the department of history
>how long has these website been running
> why did you start this website
>how many books have you wrote
>why did you start to write books
>how many articles have you written
it would be great if you could give send me the information by the 17/05/2018 Australian time
From Australian Myths
Hi!
I believe you will find the answers to most of these questions here: http://web.pdx.edu/~carrk/ and here: https://www.pdx.edu/history/bio-carr and here: https://quatr.us/who-we-are-about-quatr-us but
I have published one book all by myself, and a number of chapters in books that were written by more than one person. I write books because I want people to change their thinking about something, and a book is a way of presenting them with new ideas and the evidence to back up those ideas. I’m not sure if you mean scholarly articles or articles on the website? There are about 2400 articles on Quatr.us Study Guides. I don’t know how many scholarly articles I’ve published; maybe ten?
I hope that helps!
this is my first site I go to see more about ancient chine. thanks for writing this article!
You’re welcome! I’m glad we could help!
When was gunpowder first used in america
When the Spanish landed in the Caribbean, with Christopher Columbus, in 1492.
would you happen to have a article on silk
Yes! It’s here: https://quatr.us/china/silk-ancient-chinese-clothing.htm . You might also be interested in our article about Chinese inventions in general: https://quatr.us/china/science-ancient-medieval-china.htm and in our article on hemp clothing (Poorer people in China wore hemp): https://quatr.us/china/hemp-cloth-chinese-clothing.htm
how is it being in Department of History and how many books have you written
I love my department, though I don’t spend much time there anymore. I have written one book all by myself, and chapters in several other books. Some were about the fall of Rome in Spain. Others were about Roman pottery in North Africa. I’m working on a book about the history of swimming, and on one about what a typical day was like for different famous people from history.
have you done any book on weapons
Other than the archery article, which you’ve already found, you might look at our articles on
early African warfare: https://quatr.us/africa/early-african-warfare-mercenaries-catapults.htm
horseback archery: https://quatr.us/central-asia/horses-archery-central-asian-warfare.htm
hoplite soldiers: https://quatr.us/greeks/greek-hoplite-war-ancient-greece-htm.htm
mercenary soldiers: https://quatr.us/war/mercenaries-military-history.htm
the victorious army problem: https://quatr.us/war/victorious-army-problem.htm
when was the first weapon made
The first weapon using gunpowder was probably the fire-spear, made about 900 AD. Or did you mean the first weapon of any kind? Chimpanzees use wooden sticks as spears, so probably the very earliest human ancestors did too.
thanks that was really helpful , this website is now my 1st come too for answer
Wonderful!
what was the first army name that used gunpowder
It’s the very end of the T’ang Dynasty, under Emperor Zhaozong, but I’m not sure whether it’s his army, or the army of rebels that was fighting him, that first used gunpowder in war.
I’m doing a school project on gunpowder and this really helped :) thank you
me too
thank how did it help them Prentice them
Sorry, I don’t understand the question? Can you rephrase?
this is very helpful and I needed it to write a five to six page essay on ancient Chinese gunpowder for my writing class thank you for writing it !
have you written other articles
Yes, this site has more than two thousand articles! You can find them all listed here: https://quatr.us/site-index
hi
great website really help me
Did the Chinese purchase this gun powder, and if they did how much was it?
At first, scientists had to make it for themselves. As it became more common, yes, you could buy it in stores. It’s not really possible to compare prices from then to now, because some things have become cheaper, while other things have become more expensive. I don’t think gunpowder was ever hard to afford though: it’s not hard to make, and the ingredients aren’t hard to find.
i dont get it but maybe it was invented for weapons purposefully but just hidden like a secret experiment
No, that’s not likely, because it took hundreds of years after gunpowder was invented before anyone thought of using it as a weapon. Scientists just invented it because they were trying different combinations of things to see what would happen. They didn’t have any particular result in mind.
hi
who technically invented gunpowder?
That’s in the article?
also, I love your website
Thanks!
did it make life easier or harder?
Hmm, that is a hard question. I think in the end guns made life easier for people who had them, and harder for people who didn’t have them. But even for people who had guns, your chances of being killed in battle went way up once armies on both sides had a lot of guns.
did they use it for other purposes besides as wepons and entertainment?
Not right away, but yes, eventually people used gunpowder to blast holes in rock for mining, or to knock down old buildings, for example. It helped to level out the roadway in order to build better roads. That’s a great question; I’ll have to add that to the article.
I need it for a project
why did they invent gunpowder
As far as we can tell, they were just messing around, experimenting to see what would happen. They don’t seem to have had any particular goal in mind. That’s how a lot of science gets done, though other times people are looking specifically for a solution to a problem.
The invention of the gunpowder a purely by chance. They were trying to come up with a portion/ medicine that would help their emperor live forever. The mixture exploded and awed them. With time, they started using it for entertainment and much later, discovered that they could use it for warfare.
This is not the way I tell it in my article, because this story makes Chinese scientist sound like babies who didn’t know what they were doing. These were educated chemists doing experiments, not accidents. In my opinion, the story that they were seeking eternal life was made up later by people who didn’t understand that scientists often do experiments just to find out what will happen, without any particular goal in mind.
I am curious about how gunpowder impacted China? Did they just blow stuff up and everyone thought that was cool and went on with their lives, or did it leave a notable impact on China?
Once they realized you could use it to fight wars, Chinese governments did use gunpowder, especially in fire-bombs launched from catapults, to kill people.
Quatr.us does not support the use of guns or gunpowder for ANY purpose?! If it wasn’t for guns and gunpowder, you would have most likely been living in [the] third world … and your bloodline most likely would have been wiped out centuries ago. Quit being a pathetic cupcake and deal with it. Guns are a tool. […]
(I edited your comment to take out most of the insults and all the swears.) My family was very lucky to avoid being wiped out in the genocide of World War II. Guns have only hurt my ancestors. And even if they had been helped, using them to force other people to do things would still be wrong.
I agree with Ms. Karen Carr. Just because you may approve of guns doesn’t give you the right to be disrespectful and flat-out rude. Also, guns are dangerous things, not a matter to be made fun of! When you’re behind a gun it’s much easier to pull the trigger blindly, much like on the internet. Please think about what you’re typing and if you’d want it commented on an article you worked hard to write for other’s use before your comment hurts someone else’s feelings!
Thanks, Skylark! (But it’s Professor Carr, not Ms. Carr, please!)
In the first paragraph you stated that Wei Boyang was the first to write about gunpowder, was he also the first to develop it in China?
Well, if somebody developed gunpowder earlier, we don’t know about it. Probably Wei Boyang was the first, because he writes about it like it’s a new thing he just thought of, not something that had already been around for a while.
I was wondering what is a Taoist i thought he would’ve been an alchemist
Taoism is a Chinese philosophy or religion. You can read more about it here: https://quatr.us/china/tao-taoism-ancient-china.htm. Wei Boyang was not an alchemist; alchemists tried to find ways to change other things into gold. But he was certainly a kind of chemist.
We are doing a class project about Chinese inventions and this really helped me. Can I plz use you as a source :)
Of course! You don’t need my permission in order to quote me. The citation format is at the bottom of the article.
Hi
My biggest question is that why was it such a big thing for weapons and entertainment?
Was it because it put on a spectacle or what?
It took a long time for gunpowder to find a use, but yes, its first uses were because it was exciting to watch it explode. Later on, people realized you could use it as a weapon too.
i am awesome
this is a cool article
你好嗎？
What was the first recorded use of gunpowder? was it the Chinese against the Mongols, if so do you have any details on that war/battle?
The first recorded use of gunpowder was for fireworks, not in battle. Do you mean the first use of gunpowder as a weapon? The first evidence of it is from 904 AD, which is hundreds of years before the Mongol invasions.
Where was the place that invents gunpowder ???
I’m pretty sure that’s in the article, George.
When it was first invented it was called Black Power but now it gunpowder.Why did they change the name into gunpowder?
When it was first invented it was called something in Chinese, yes? But they couldn’t call it gunpowder because they hadn’t invented guns yet. That took another thousand years. “Black powder” is our modern name for the early kind of gunpowder made by mixing sulphur, charcoal, and saltpeter. What we use today – “smokeless gunpowder” – is made of a lot of complicated man-made chemicals. You can read about them here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smokeless_powder
What is gunpowder mad out of and when was this published?
The publication date is at the end of the article, with all the other citation information. Do you mean gunpowder back when it was first invented, or today? We don’t make it exactly the same way today as people did then.
I need help.
Happy to help anytime! You’ll need to ask your question though.
Hello, when was this published? I will be using this for school work and I need to know!
Also, Why was gunpowder made?
That would depend on who was making it. At first, gunpowder was just a sort of science experiment, and it may even have been made accidentally, while trying to make something else. Later, people used it for fireworks. Then they started to work on ways to make it into a weapon. That process, from science to fireworks to weapons, took about a thousand years.
The citation info is right below the end of the article on every page.
i have a question how does gunpowder work
You can find out about that here: http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=4130
Just asking but how many people used gunpowder every years?
I’m not sure what you are asking? Which years? In the very beginning, only a few specialists knew about gunpowder. Today, millions of people use it every day.
because iv posted like 5 things but the next day there gone
I am deleting your comments because they are disrespectful. I’ll keep deleting them until you have something more interesting or kind to say.
Hi.
hi
hi
i need help
I’m happy to help! What’s your question?
please me need help help
What’s your question?
What historical role did gunpowder play from the middle ages on?
I think that’s your homework, Yuki?
i need help please!!!!
What’s your question, Nathan? I’d be happy to answer it.
what new inventions were made with gunpowder. And dont tell me to look it up because im lazy
Hmm, what if I am lazy too? What would *you* make with gunpowder?
what impact did gunpowder had on the Chinese in the Golden Age
That sounds like your homework?
i need help on a essay for a school project i need info
I’d be happy to help, but you have to ask specific questions I can answer. “Info” is too general.
Who really made it?(dont say Chinese people)
Who was first person who test out gunpowder?
Without gunpowder what will happen?
Why did they keep gunpowder as a secret?
The answers to these questions are in the article, or they are things your teacher wants you to think about for yourself.
How did other civilizations change the gunpowder????????
We don’t really cover that on this page; gunpowder changes much later on, in the modern period, to make it more stable and reliable.
Hi there my name is amee and i am doing gunpowder for my project in school and i am in 7th grade.I need all the information in this website but i cant really find what i need so i have to ask you this question and i really hope you answer it if you dont i dont really mind so “why was it invented?” and “what make it so important?”
I think the answer to “Why was it invented” is that scientists were just interested in what would happen if you mixed different things together, and they happened to mix things that exploded. That must have been exciting!
And I think you can figure out for yourself why gunpowder is important!
Thank for your help!
hola
hi Prof..your information help me a lots on understanding the existence of gun powder..is it the gun powder also known as black powder?
Yes, early gunpowder is also called “black powder” to distinguish it from modern, smokeless gunpowder that is made a little bit differently.
Hey I was wondering if maybe you could post your sources on this. I am a UCLA student writing a final paper on gunpowder, it would be really helpful. Thanks!
Whoops just noticed the bibliography! Disregard!
Oh, I’m glad that worked out for you! Best of luck with your paper.
lol!
Hi
No really I need more info
What would you like to know? I’ll be happy to answer if I can.
hi
hi
Hi yourself! Thanks for stopping by.
hi
Hi yourself! Thanks for stopping by!
hi