How did black powder come about?

Answer 1

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Saltpeter was known to the Chinese by the mid-1st century AD and there is strong evidence of

the use of saltpetre and sulfur in various largely medicinal combinations.[19] A Chinese alchemical text dated 492 AD noted saltpetre burnt with a purple flame, providing a practical and reliable means of distinguishing it from other inorganic salts, thus enabling alchemists to evaluate and compare purification techniques.[20]

The first reference of gunpowder is possibly the passage of the Zhenyuan miaodao yaolüe, a Taoist text tentatively dated to the mid-800s CE:[20]

Some have heated together sulfur, realgar and saltpeter with honey; smoke and flames result, so that their hands and faces have been burnt, and even the whole house where they were working burned down.[21]

By the 9th century Taoist monks or alchemists searching for an elixir of immortality had serendipitously stumbled upon gunpowder.[22][23] The Chinese "Wu Ching Tsung Yao", written by Tseng Kung-Liang in 1044, provides encyclopedia references to a variety of mixtures which included petrochemicals, as well as garlic and honey. A slow match for flame throwing mechanisms using the siphon principal and for fireworks and rockets are mentioned. Academics argue the Chinese wasted little time in applying gunpowder to warfare, and they produced a variety of gunpowder weapons, including flamethrowers, rockets, bombs, and mines, before inventing guns as a projectile weapon.[24]