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Japanese ashigaru firing hinawajū.Night-shooting practice, using ropes to maintain proper firing elevation. Tanegashima (), most often called in Japanese and sometimes in English hinawajū (火縄銃, "matchlock gun"), was a type of matchlock-configured [1] arquebus [2] firearm introduced to Japan through the Portuguese Empire in 1543. [3]
Portuguese firearms were introduced in 1543, [2] and intense development followed, with strong local manufacture during the period of conflicts of the late 16th century. Hōjutsu, the art of gunnery, is the Japanese martial art dedicated to firearms usage.
Ashigaru wearing armor and jingasa firing tanegashima (Japanese matchlocks). Ashigaru (足軽, "light of foot") were infantry employed by the samurai class of feudal Japan.The first known reference to ashigaru was in the 14th century, [1] but it was during the Ashikaga shogunate (Muromachi period) that the use of ashigaru became prevalent by various warring factions.
Though interpretations of ōdzutsu differ in literature, it is generally regarded as a weapon of forged iron to distinguish it from an ishibiya (a cast bronze hand cannon). Its bullets were about 20 maces (75 g (2.6 oz)). It is fixed to a ring or a wooden frame with only the barrel and fired using a difference fire.
The Chinese used the term "bird-gun" to refer to muskets and Turkish muskets may have reached China before Portuguese ones. [16] A Japanese Arquebus with a rain cover, c. 1598. In Japan, the first documented introduction of the matchlock, which became known as the tanegashima, was through the Portuguese in 1543. [17]
The musket, essentially a large arquebus, was introduced around 1521, but fell out of favor by the mid-16th century due to the decline of armor. The term, however, remained and musket became a generic descriptor for smoothbore gunpowder weapons fired from the shoulder ("shoulder arms") into the mid-19th century. [18]
The French-built Matsushima, flagship of the Imperial Japanese Navy at the Battle of the Yalu River (1894), used a 320 mm (13 in) Canet gun.. Following the Meiji Restoration, Japan would pursue a policy of "Rich country, strong army" (富国強兵), which led to a general rearmament of the country.
As Japanese swordsmiths began mass-producing matchlock firearms and firearms became used in war, the use of Lamellar armour (ō-yoroi and dō-maru), previously used as samurai armour, gradually decreased. Japanese armour makers started to make new types of armour made of larger iron plate and plated leather. [8]