158 
CANNON AT CRESSY. 
A fourteenth century MS., “Les Grandes Chroniques de St. Denis,” 
tells us that at Cressy the English used three guns, — “ getterent trois 
canons ”; and the writer hints that it may have been owing to their 
fire that the Genoese crossbowmen gave way.* This suggestion is 
certainly baseless. Whether we had guns, or whether we had not, the 
Genoese were put to flight and the battle was won by the English 
archers. 
From the “ Istorie Pistolesi 99 an anonymous chronicle said (with 
apparent truth) to have been written about the same time as the 
chronicles of John Yillani, i.e., before 1348, it would appear that when 
the crisis of Cressy arrived, the English knights, taking with them 
the Black Prince, a body of wild Welch ( f uomini salvatichi’) and 
many bombards, advanced to attack the French army.”j* The phrase 
“ many bombards 9 is, no doubt, a gross exaggeration ; but we must 
make allowance for the writer’s lively Italian imagination. 
Giovanni Yillani, the Italian chronicler, was a banker by profession. 
He travelled much in the ordinary transaction of his business, and he 
doubtless obtained what bankers have always contrived to obtain, the 
very best available information about foreign affairs. “ The English 
guns at Cressy,” says this trustworthy writer, “ made a noise like 
thunder and caused much loss in men and horses .“ Gibbon has 
thrown out a sort of objection” to the use of guns at Cressy, says 
Hallam, “ on account of Froissart’s silence. But the positive 
testimony of Yillani, who died within two years afterwards, and had 
manifestly obtained much information as to the great events passing 
in France, cannot be rejected.”§ It must not be supposed that 
Yillani’s account of our guns at Cressy is confined to a stray allusion 
such as the sentence above quoted. Throughout his narrative of the 
battle he consistently connects the effects produced by the archers 
and the gunners. He had previously said that “ the guns shot forth 
iron bullets by means of fire, to terrify and destroy the horses of the 
French 99 ; || and he afterwards mentions that “ the Genoese archers 
were continually being hit by the archers and gunners.’’^ He adds 
that “ the whole plain was covered by men struck down by arrows and 
cannon-ball.”** It is difficult to believe that these repeated allusions 
to our guns were due to the mendacity of Yillani or of his informants. 
Yet the evidence of Yillani has been looked upon with more or less 
* Quoted in “ Ancient Cannon, etc.,” as “Brit. Mus. MS., Cotton, Nero, E. II., part 2, fol. 
397.” The writer of the chronicles also hints at treason :—“ si ne scet ou si ce fust par trahyson, 
mais Dieu le sceut.” I quote M. Rigollot’s version, with its curious Arabic termination, - ‘ but 
God knows best ’: w'allahu cCalarm. 
f Prato, 1835 ; p. 459. 
J “ Istorie Piorentini,” in “ Classici Ital,” Milan, 1803; VIII., 173. 
§“ Middle Ages ” ; I., 478. 
|| As above; p. 171. 
f Ibid., p. 174. 
** Ibid., p. 176. The word used by Villani is 1 pallotole,* which evidently corresponds with the 
* pellets * of Chaucer and the ‘ pilles * of Eabelais. 
