1872.] Mediaeval and Modern Ordnance. 341 
We now come to the great cannon of the Dardanelles, 
which ‘‘ have been a subject of wonder to travellers and of 
interest to artillerymen from the earliest period. There are 
no other examples of guns which have remained in use for 
four centuries, and are still in a very real sense effective 
pieces of ordnance. ‘They testify to the former energy and 
power of the Ottoman race as no other military monument 
does, and remind us of an event which has had a greater 
influence on the politics of Europe than almost any other 
within the same period—the fall of Constantinople. “Monu- 
ments of the military genius of Muhammad II., they 
remind us also of ‘“‘the splendour and the havoc of the 
East,” by their prodigious size and cost and power. They 
form a class apart, and although there is reason to think 
that they are referable to a Flemish original, they bear the 
stamp of a national character and of an epoch of conquest 
of which European history presents scarce any other 
example.” These guns were formerly very numerous, there 
being between forty to fifty of them at least. According to 
Mr. Wrench, H.M. Vice Consul, there were extant—twenty- 
one in 1868, three of which were since broken up, and two 
others sentenced to the same end; so excluding the one pre- 
sented to Her Majesty there now remain fifteen: ten of 
these, comprising the largest (29°5 inches calibre), are in the 
Fort Kilit Bahar, on the European side of the Dardanelles, 
and the remaining five in the Sultanieh Fort of Chanak 
Ckalessi, on the Asiatic side of the straits. The Kilit 
Bahar guns average 25°25 inches calibre, the smallest bore 
being 19°5, and the Chanak guns 23°6 inches; the date 
of their construction extends from A.D. 1458 to 1521. 
General Lefroy surmises that those guns dated 1521 may 
possibly have been cast on the island of Rhodes for the sub- 
jection of that fortress, which fell December 22nd, 1522; 
and there is all the more reason for supposing this to have 
been the case, when we consider the Turkish habit of 
casting great ordnance on the spot where they were wanted 
with extraordinary energy and readiness. ‘Thus, ‘‘in the 
first siege of Rhodes, 1480, Muhammad caused sixteen 
great pieces to be cast, called basilisks or double cannon, 
18 feet long, and carrying a ball of 2 or 3 feet diameter; 
and here also we are told that their mortars ‘‘ threw stones 
of a prodigious size, which flying through the air by the 
force of powder fell into the city, and lighting upon houses 
broke through the roofs, made their way through several 
stories, and crushed to pieces all that they fell upon; 
nobody was safe from them, and it was this kind of attack 
that gave the greatest terror to the Rhodians. 
