A firearm dating from the 15th-c, a development of the hand cannon, in outline a forerunner of the musket. Fired in action by a flame held to the touch-hole, the weapon was supported by a forked rest holding up the barrel at the operator's chest height.
The Arquebus (sometimes spelled harquebus or hackbut- possibly related to German 'Hackebuechse') was a primitive firearm used in the 15th to 17th centuries.
Heavy arquebuses mounted on wagons were called arquebus à croc.
Effectiveness
As low-velocity firearms, they were used against enemies that were often partially or fully protected by steel-plate armour. This was essentially the era of the arquebus. Good suits of plate would usually stop an arquebus ball. It was a common practice to "proof" armour by firing a pistol or arquebus at a new breastplate.
Mechanism
The arquebus was fired by a matchlock mechanism and had a larger bore than its predecessors. The flared muzzle made it easier to load the weapon, and the arquebusier braced the gun's barrel into a pole with a forked end when firing. The name 'hook gun' is often claimed to be based on the bent shape of the arquebus's butt.
History
The arquebus came into prominence during the Battle of Pavia in 1525.
By the later 16th century, muskets began to slowly replace the arquebus across Europe.
The first arquebuses were introduced in Japan in 1543 by Portuguese traders (Fernão Mendes Pinto), who landed by accident on Tanegashima, an island south of Kyūshū in the region controlled by the Shimazu clan. By 1550, copies of the Portuguese arquebus were being produced in large quanties, and they were often seen on the battlefields all over Japan. In the Battle of Nagashino in 1575, Lord Oda Nobunaga placed three lines of ashigaru armed with these weapons behind wooden palisades and prepared for the Cavalry charge of his opponent. Such tactics allowed a balance of mass firepower to compensate for poor accuracy with a reasonable rate of fire.
In terms of accuracy, the arquebus was extremely inferior to archery. However, the arquebus had a faster rate of fire than the most powerful of crossbows, had a shorter learning curve than a longbow, and was more powerful than both.
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