Wars used to be fought a lot different. Over the last few hundreds years, warfare has been entirely remade. There are several reasons why these changes have happened over time, but one of the biggest ones was the creation of gunpowder. The invention of gunpowder revolutionized the ancient world, and was the first step towards creating the modern age.
From the beginning of time wars have been fought, and battles won and lost, using the most basic of weapons. Simple stones have been used in battle for thousands and thousands of years. Some of the most common uses were slings, where you would place a stone into a pouch, and swing it in a circular motion as you gained speed and the released the stone at your enemy. Stones where also attached to…show more content… They believe that alchemists where working on creating a potion for immortality when they created gunpowder by chance. Gun powder is considered one of the four great inventions of china. Although, at its creation, gunpowder was not used for wars or fighting. it only began appearing in wars around the 13th century. Its first uses were actually quite the opposite. it was used for healing and curing diseases and infections, and also much more fun things than war like fireworks, or scaring away evil spirits.
The very first uses of gunpowder in war was actually just fire. One example is the flaming arrow. It was created by filling a small pouch or tube with gunpowder, which was then attached near the end of the arrow, lit on fire, and shot at the enemy. counterweights were attached to the back of the arrow so it would still fly correctly. other weapons were just pouches and other things filled with gunpowder, which would be lit and then thrown to create a shower of flaming…show more content… before gunpowder, knights and other men would get their swords, and they would charge each other and start fighting, in one huge confusing mob of people. once guns became popular, it all became somewhat more organized. one of the most popular tactics was just to get a huge group of mean, get them in a formation, and the two army's would stand in front of each other and just fire into the others ranks of men. there were certain tactics, like the first line would fire, and then instantly kneel and start reloading, while the second line fired. and began reloading in the same way, and the third would fire, and so on, until the first line was either reloaded or all dead.
The creation of semi and fully automatic weapons changed this once again, because the old way of just standing in front of each other could get hundreds of thousands killed in just moments by the power of the fully automatic weapons. trench warfare was created, where the army would dig trenches in the ground and get in them for cover, and then both armies would be right across from each other, just taking cover in trenches instead of standing on land. But trench warfare had its own set of horrible