JF Ptak Science Books
"Bombing: An attacking with bombs; bombarding; the action or operation of throwing or dropping bombs."--Oxford English Dictionary
- 1691 N. Luttrell Diary in Brief Hist. Relation State Affairs (1857) II. 195 The bombing of which had cost them a good summ of money and men.
- 1719 T. D'Urfey Wit & Mirth II. 129 The General would leave Bombing, Of Towns in hot Campaigns.
- 1915 Daily Mail 18 May 6/4 Three Air Raids on Calais. Futile bombing by 3 Zeppelins.
- "Die Eintheilung der Mörser und ihrer Laffeten, samt dem dazu gehörigen Ernst-Feuerwerck vorstellend", Augsburg, 1745. 13.5x18.5". Printed on a very thick paper. Very good condition. $150
What I had in my mind when seeing this hand-colored engraving was Sven Lindqvist's History of Bombing--except that Lindqvist is much more interested in the modern history of bombing, and that mostly by airplane. But these are certainly 'bombs" described here, shot from mortars. Some folks might not think of this action as "bombing", but it certainly is according to the OED. What is remarkable in this image is that there is a descritpion and cross section for exploding and incendiary bombs, which at this point would probably be more accurately described as "shells". This is relatively early to see described in a general technical work in 1745, though the exploding shell itself goes back several centuries before this in the West and a little further in the East, so it is not a "first" description of the weapon, though it is a very young appearance of it. (We'll not include the flaming/diseased/etc animal carcasses that would sometimes be launched with unholy venom by trebucet or whatever in the centuries before these centuries-before.)
The print is entitled "Die Eintheilung der Mörser und ihrer Laffeten, samt dem dazu gehörigen Ernst-Feuerwerck vorstellend" and is plate 43 in Mathematischer Atlas : in welchem auf 60 Tabellen alle Theile der Mathematic vorgestellet und nicht allein überhaupt zu bequemer Wiederholung, sondern auch den Anfängern besonders zur Aufmunterung durch deutliche Beschreibung u. Figuren entworfen werden, which was assembled by (Dr. Johann) Tobias Mayer (ca.1723-1762) and published in Augsburg in 1745.
Here's a good link for the entire work, available from the German Digital Library via Goettingen.
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