A late medieval or early modern light gun barrel from the Castle Museum in Malbork—typology, technology of manufacture and identification of the smelting process

A light gun barrel from the Castle Museum in Malbork, Poland, dating to the late 15th or early 16th century, provides new insights into medieval metallurgy. The study reveals that the barrel, originally part of a handheld gun and later repurposed as a cannon, was made using the direct (bloomery) smelting process. This conclusion is supported by metallographic examinations and slag inclusion analysis with multivariate statistics, which identified the metal's composition as unevenly carburized soft steel (c. 0.1–0.2% C). The findings contribute to our understanding of early firearm manufacturing techniques in Europe.

Żabiński, G., Biborski, M., & Miśta-Jakubowska, E. A. (2018). A late medieval or early modern light gun barrel from the Castle Museum in Malbork—typology, technology of manufacture and identification of the smelting process. Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, 11(5), 2007–2026. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-018-0653-3