Saturday, August 22, 2020

Greek Fire, the Most Powerful Weapon of Byzantine Army Essay -- Byzant

War is the dad of all things.1 Volkman starts his book, Science Goes to War, with this statement from Heraclitus, the Greek rationalist. Volkman utilizes the statement to propose that many, if not every single, logical headway owe their introduction to the world to the longing for or the dread of war. Discharge is without a doubt a piece of this headway as Bert Hall brings up, Shoot is one of the early stage powers of nature, and ignitable weapons have had a spot in armed forces' toolboxs for nearly insofar as cultivated states have made war.2 Of the considerable number of apparatuses at the removal of the Byzantine Empire's military, the 'supposed' Greek discharge was the most important.3 Greek shoot was a weapon framework that permitted Byzantine boats, as right on time as the seventh century, to heave discharge at its foes. On the boat's front was the leader of a lion or some other enormity, cast in metal or iron. In it's mouth was a bronze siphon that could turn back and forth.4 The blazing fluid that regurgitated from this siphon accompanied the thundering sound and a dark haze of smoke. What aggravates it is that it even consumes while in water.5 The dread it imparted in adversaries in some cases egged men in full plate protective layer to jump in the water, realizing they will be hauled down to the base basically in light of the fact that suffocating was desirable over being scorched alive.6 Such a dazzling mammoth of a weapon was at that point inclined to legend and gossip. In any case, even as true to life as Greek fire seemed to be, its haze of equivocalness is, to be perfectly honest, silly. Put as precisely and exquisitely as could be expected under the circumstances, Greek fire was a misnomer enveloped by a misguided judgment, confounded in interpretation, hidden in mystery, and adorned with apocrypha.7 At one point, one of the Byzantine sovereigns wrote in a letter to his child that Greek fire was uncovered and ta... ...timore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1960. p. 19. Parkington, James Riddick Parkington. Beginnings and Development of Applied Chemistry. New York: Arno Press, 1975. Roland, Alex. Audit of A History of Greek Fire and Gunpowder, by James Riddick Parkington, Technology and Culture, Vol. 41. No. 1 (Jan., 2000). Roland, Alex. â€Å"Secrecy, Technology, and War: Greek Fire and the Defense of Byzantium, 678-1204.† Technology and Culture Vol. 33, No. 4 (1992): 655-679. Russel, Bertrand. History of Western Philosophy. London: George Allen and Unwin LTD, 1946. p. 60. Stannard, Jerry. Survey of A History of Greek Fire and Gunpowder, by James Riddick Parkington, Philosophy of Science, Vol. 29. No. 4 (Oct., 1962). Volkman, Ernest. Science Goes to War: The Search for the Ultimate Weapon, from Greek Fire to Star Wars. New York:John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 2002.

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