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A rare Korean bronze breech-loading cannon, Fu Lang JiJoseon Dynasty, 17th or 18th century
Sold for US$7,605 inc. premium
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Find your local specialistA rare Korean bronze breech-loading cannon, Fu Lang Ji
Joseon Dynasty, 17th or 18th century
Joseon Dynasty, 17th or 18th century
Condition: Showing a fine green patination with scattered minor marks. Breech chamber missing.
See Illustration
Footnotes
Note: One of a group of Korean guns presumed to have been captured in 1871 during the amphibious assaults by the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps against the Korean river forts on Kanghwa Island. Other examples with nearly identical inscriptions can be seen in the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, the National Museum of the Marine Corps, at Fort Monroe and in the Korean Army Museum.
The lack of a reign mark in the insription makes it virtually impossible to accurately date the gun as the year date could variously be read as early as 1313 and as late as 1913 or any sixty year interval in between. As the guns would clearly seem to be derived from the 16th/17th century Portuguese breech-loaders of similar design, a date in the 17th or 18th century would seem the most plausible.
The term for these guns, Fu Lang Ji, would seem to derive from the Middle Eastern term firangi, used since the crusades to refer to Europeans, or 'Franks' and refer to the European source for the design.