firearm
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Royal Canadian Artillery firing shells from a field howitzer in Sicily in 1943. Mobile field artillery such as this was used extensively to support army divisions during World War II. Allied troops landed in Sicily in 1943 at the start of the liberation of Italy from German occupation.
Weapon from which projectiles are discharged by the combustion of an explosive. Firearms are generally divided into two main sections: artillery (ordnance or cannon), with a bore greater than 2.54 cm/1 in, and small arms, with a bore of less than 2.54 cm/1 in.
Although gunpowder was known in Europe 60 years previously, the invention of guns dates from 1300 to 1325, and is attributed to Berthold Schwartz, a German monk.
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