After the manufacture and use of gunpowder and firearms in China was transmitted to the West, it aroused great interest among Western firearms researchers and firearm historians. They either manufacture firearms suitable for the West in practice, or conduct in-depth research in theory, put forward their own ideas, and achieve many new results. However, there are also some western researchers in the history of firearms who have put forward one kind or another of "gunpowder invention theory" that cannot withstand scrutiny, among which the more famous ones are "Greek fire" and "sea fire".
First, "Greek fire" was not early gunpowder
"Greek Fire" is an incendiary agent that does not contain nitrate, and some western researchers on the history of firearms say that it is early gunpowder, which is unfounded.
1. The origin and use of "Greek fire"
Originally created by the Arabs and later restructured by the Greeks, the "Greek Fire" was also known as "WildFire", which was used in warfare in the 5th and 4th centuries BC, lasted for more than 1,000 years, and was used in some countries in the East and the West, and was a major fire attack instrument used before the invention of gunpowder.
The recipe for "Greek fire" is numerous and little known. In 350 BC, the Greek tactician Tektikos wrote down a recipe consisting of ignition such as sulfur, asphalt, and pine resin, as well as flammable substances such as hemp chips.
The "Greek fire", which had been improved by the Greeks, spread back to Arabia and India. It is said that in 326 BC, the Indians used "Greek fire" to effectively resist the attack of Alexander the Great (reigned 356 BC - 323 BC).
The use of "Greek fire" on the battlefields of Europe is the earliest record of the offensive and defensive battles of Darum in 424 BC and the offensive and defensive battles of Rhodes in 304 BC.
During the 11th-13th centuries when the European Crusaders invaded Arabia, both sides used "Greek fire" as a means of fire in battle. However, after people's research, the main components of the "Greek fire" used at that time were honey fat, sulfur, wood grass, animal fat, rosin, naphtha, asphalt, powdery metal matter, etc., except for no nitrate.
2. Misinformation of the nature of "Greek fire"
The first person to describe "Greek fire" as a firearm was Waltu of Italy (1413-1482), who, in his Twelve Volumes of the Art of War, written in 1450, mentioned that during the reign of the Byzantine Emperor Leo VI (866-912), he ordered his soldiers to use a "firearm" to counter the enemy, and called this "throwing weapon" gunpowder arrow. However, europeans at this time did not know the substance of nitrate, let alone the use of gunpowder arrows. Therefore, Waltu's statement is nothing more than misinformation of ordinary "throwers" as gunpowder arrows.
As of the 11th and 20th centuries, some Western scholars still believed in their writings that the "Greek fire" used by the Byzantines was an improved firearm fired by rockets. For example, the French Orientalist Lanu and the artillery colonel Favey, the French chemical historian Erfe, the French Messier, the British Ellis, etc., all have this view.
The Soviet scholar Felid gogoz rejected this view, arguing that "Greek fire" was not yet a mixture of gunpowder, since it did not contain potassium nitrate in its composition. Potassium nitrate was not discovered by the Byzantines or the Egyptians, and the most likely was learned from Chinese or Arabs.
According to Jonville's "History of King St. Louis", it was not until the seventh eastern invasion of the European Crusaders (1248-1254) that the Arabs used the "Greek fire" containing nitrate, with arrows with long tail wings, to shoot at the enemy position, which was far more powerful than the "Greek fire" without nitrate, only to see the flying arrows like fire dragons through the air, like lightning, the fire shone brightly, turning night into day, and the Crusaders were finally repelled.
Since the Arabs only used the nitrate-containing "Greek fire" in the middle of the 13th century, China at this time not only had a history of using gunpowder and firearms for more than 200 years, but also developed primary firearms to the stage of tubular firearms. It can be seen that even the "Greek fire" containing nitrate is not considered early gunpowder, so the "Greek fire" that does not contain nitrate is not early gunpowder.
Another basis for Western scholars to describe "Greek fire" as early gunpowder is the Book of Burning Enemy Fire, written by the Greek Margot in the 8th and 9th centuries AD, which lists some gunpowder recipes. However, after years of research by scholars, this statement has been rejected from the following aspects.
First, the so-called Greek Margot is not really a person, but a name; Second, the book was not a temporary work of the ーren, but was supplemented by a number of Arabs; Third, it was written in the late 13th and early 14th centuries AD, not in the 8th-9th centuries.
At this point, the claim that "Greek fire" was an early gunpowder has lost its foothold.
Second, the "fire of the sea" is not early gunpowder
Another pyrotechnic agent similar to "Greek Fire" is "SeaFire" (SeaFire or WetFire).
1. The origin and use of "Fire of the Sea"
"Fire of the Sea" is different from "Greek Fire", "Greek Fire" is used in some countries in the East and the West, and is a pyrotechnic agent used for throwing; The "fire of the sea", known only to the Greeks and not circulating to the East, was a pyrotechnic agent used in naval warfare and sprayed with siphons.
The "Fire of the Sea" first appeared between 670 and 680 AD, more than a thousand years after the "Greek Fire". According to Thefanis' Chronology (811-815), in 673 AD, a Technician Kailinikos, born in Syria, fled from Heliopolis in Silesia to Constantinople, the byzantine capital, and dedicated the secret recipe of the "Fire of the Sea" to the Byzantine Emperor Constantine IV (648-685).
At the time, Constantinople was under attack by Arab armies, and Byzantium was suffering from no weapon to retreat. The "Fire of the Sea" is just like a Divine Sword given by Heaven and receives special attention. For five years, from 673 to 677, Arab armies attacked the city by land and sea. Surrounded by the sea on three sides and back to land on the other, the entire city's military and civilians stubbornly defended the Arab army under the fortified city and waited for the opportunity to counterattack. The warplanes finally arrived, and the Byzantine Fleet defeated the Arab fleet with the "Fire of the Sea" in the waters near the island of Sigikos, relieving the siege of Constantinople. In 716-718, the Arab fleet attacked the city again, and was burned by the "fire of the sea" of the Byzantine fleet, destroying more than 1,800 warships, and only 6 escaped. In 941 and 1043, the Russian fleet attacked the city twice, both defeated by the Byzantine fleet with the "Fire of the Sea".
2. Characteristics of "Fire of the Sea"
From the course of the battle, it can be seen that the "fire of the sea" is an incendiary agent with strong combustion power in naval warfare, which is sprayed to the enemy ship with a spray device, and when burning, the fire parts are accompanied by thick smoke and sounds, making it difficult for the enemy ship to defend without means of extinguishing.
Because of this, the Byzantine Empire adopted strict secrecy measures, and all the secrets about the recipe, manufacturing technology, and structure of the launcher of the "Sea Fire" were known only to the Emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire and the family of Kelinikos. Others, especially Arabs, are absolutely kept secret, and if anyone divulges a secret, they are severely punished. After the fall of the Byzantine Empire, the "fire of the sea" was extinguished.
Nevertheless, the tectonic overview of the "Sea Fire" jet device is not leak-free, and from the end of the 9th century to the beginning of the 10th century, the Byzantine Emperor Leo VI was exposed in his book "Tactics". The book states that the "Fire of the Sea" is sprayed out of a siphon tube, which is made of steel and placed on the bow of the ship, and the flame can be sprayed to the upper and lower left and right sides. The soldiers, armed with small handbourines invented, spewed fire from behind the iron shields.
It can be seen that this device is actually a hand-held cylinder, that is, the liquid fire is sprayed out from the siphon using the compressed air in the cylinder. In Skyri's Byzantine Greek manuscript, there is a schematic of a naval battle between a Byzantine warship and an Arab warship. It depicts a Byzantine soldier holding a flame-breathing canister spraying "sea fire" at an Arab warship, vividly reflecting the scene of the naval battle at that time.
Over the years, Europeans have tried many times to solve the mystery of the "fire of the sea". In the 18th century, the British antiquarian Gross (1731-1791) in his book "Military Cultural Relics", it was determined that the composition of the "fire of the sea" was only sulfur, asphalt and oil. In the 19th century, British Royal Artillery Colonel Heim, in his book "The Origin of Artillery", believed that the main components of the "sea fire" were asphalt, sulfur, naphtha, resin, quicklime, oil, wax and charcoal, which were fluid mixtures without nitrate. It can be seen that the "fire of the sea", like the "Greek fire", is not an early gunpowder.