Tactics of Sixteenth-century Galley Artillery

Abstract

The use of artillery in Mediterranean galley warfare was often perceived as being restricted to the firing of single salvos at very short range before ramming and boarding the enemy ship enabled the main fight in close combat. The article contests the reasons contemporary literature gives for this tactic and argues that it was both feasible and beneficial to fire multiple times, starting at a relatively long range. It shows that galley captains at Lepanto had orders to fire multiple times and that many of them, on both sides, actually did. Senior military experts advocated a variant of the multiple-shot artillery tactic as the core of an innovative doctrine of galley warfare that involved fighting with artillery at a distance, without boarding.

Key words:

• Galley artillery
• galley warfare
• galley tactics
• ramming and boarding
• centreline- gun
• effective range
• Lepanto artillery
• reloading

Notes

¹The pound generally used for artillery nomenclature was equal to 0.32 kg, even in places where the local pound was different. For instance, Venetian pounds were either 0.477 kg (libra grossa) or 0.302 kg (libra sottile) but a 50-pound Venetian cannonball weighed 16 kg or 35.2 English lb.

²Ruscelli, Precetti, 37.

³Lane, Venetian Ships, 265.

⁴Canale, Della Milizia Maritime, 166–70.

⁵Busca, Della espugnatione, 57–61.

⁶‘comme dall'esperienza continuamente si vede che di moltipezzi che si scaricano di lontano uno in pena e per sorte colpiscePantera, L'Armata Navale, 85–6.

⁷Quoted in Jurien de la Graviere, Les Derniers Jours de la Marine a Ram.es, 112–13.

⁸Guilmartin, Galleons and Galleys, 138–9.

⁹Canale, Della Milizia Maritima, 61; Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 43 and 47; Marteilhe, Memoires, 457; Eliav, ‘The Gun and Corsia of Early Modern Mediterranean Galleys’, 262–74.

¹⁰Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 45.

¹¹This paragraph is based on: Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 45–6; Lambert, War at Sea, 39–41; Fourniere, Hydrographie, 105–6; Manucy, Artillery Through the Ages; Douglas, A Treatise on Naval Gunnery, 494–505.

¹²Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 58; Crescentio, Nautica Mediterranea, 26.

¹³‘Au commandement d'un coup de sifflet, la chiurme s'empare de deux cables et tire dessus rapidementpour remettre le canon en batterie’, Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 44.

¹⁴Pantera, L'Armata Navale, 135.

¹⁵Canale, Della Milizia Marittima, 66; Ridella: ‘Genoese Ordnance’, 43.

¹⁶Marteilhe, Memoires, 456–7.

¹⁷Mark's Handbook, 3–26; Dubbel Handbook, A 17.

¹⁸Lambert, War at Sea, 39.

¹⁹Hall, Weapons and Warfare, 153.

²⁰Douglas, Treatise on Naval Gunnery, 485.

²¹Furttenbach, Architectura Navalis, 46; Crescentio, Nautica Mediterranea, 510; Canale, Della Milizia Marittima, 168.

²²Guilmartin, Gunpowder and Galleys, 277–83 and 173.

²³Birringuccio, Pirotechnica, 172v-173r.

²⁴Collado, Prattica Manuale dell'Artigleria, 36 and 97.

²⁵Canale, Della Milizia Maritima, 66.

²⁶Guilmartin, Gunpowder and Galleys, 163. The author provides no evidence or analysis to support his estimates.

²⁷Refer to Guilmartin, Gunpowder and Galleys, 201–3 for a detailed explanation.

²⁸Girolamo Diedo, ‘La Battaglia di Lepanto’, 31.

²⁹Bondioli, Burlet and Zysberg, ‘Oar Mechanics and Oar Power’, 172–205, 201–3.

³⁰This paragraph refers only to the use of artillery on the regular galleys; its use by the galleasses is a different issue.

³¹‘le artiglierie dei Christiani si in essa battaglia come corni, inanti che le galee s'abbordessero insieme, furono scaricate due, tre, & chi cinque volte, & specialmente 1 cannoni di Corsia , Contarini, Delle cose successe, 52r.

³²‘Attendando d'essere urtati da'nemici, giocavano, come facevano l'altre nostre galee, con l'artiglieria che non tiravano in vano’, Girolamo Diedo, ‘La Battaglia di Lepanto’, 31.

³³Caracciolo, I commentari delle guerre fate con Turchi, 34–42.

³⁴‘I nostri cannoni non furono sparati se non dopo che fummo abbordatiOnorato Caetoni, letter to Cardinal di Sermoneta.

³⁵Sereno, Commentari della Guerra di Cipro, 154.

³⁶‘Et perche pare che in tutte le battaglie di mare (come ragionevole cosa e) s'habbia veduto seguir che ciascuno che ha havuto il quarto o vero il quinto dell'Armata divisa et sbrigata fuor della battaglia, et ha potuto con quell numero andar dieci o ver quindici volte sparando l'artigliarie per fianco et alle spalle del nimico, habbia anco neccessariamente ottenuto la VictoriaCanale, Della Milizia Maritima, 136. Della Rovere, Discorsi Military, 28v.

³⁷Canale, Della Milizia Maritima, 136.

³⁸Denniston, Memoires of the Dukes of Urbino vol. 3, 50.

³⁹Guido Ercole, introduction to Della Milizia Maritima, 4.

⁴⁰Sanudo, I Diarii, LV 559–61.

⁴¹‘En ce cas je . . . me garderoye d'aborder le plus que je pourroye en tosjours toupiant au tour, en tyrant de mon artillerye pour les tousjours grever’, Philippe de Cleves, ‘L'Instruction de toutes manieres de gueroyer sur mer\ in Pavoit, Philippe de Cleves, 54.

Additional information

Joseph Eliav pursued a career in research and development, system engineering and technical management, mostly in the aerospace and defence industry. He completed his PhD in Science, Technology and Society at Bar Ilan University in 2012. He has previously published on the Venetian quinquereme and is currently a post doctoral researcher at the Leon Recanati Institute of Maritime Studies, Haifa University.