What if Mesoamericans developed Gunpowder?

PhoenicianLegacy

Banned
Hey, guys, I'm posting here once again on my first day.

Can you guys imagine what it would be like if the people of Mesoamerica such as the Mayans and Aztecs were able to develop gunpowder of some sort?
I'd imagine that the canons they'd use would be essentially giant limestone bricks with holes dug in and they would be very immobile, mostly used for defense rather than offense.

Because of this, they'd easily be able to fend of the Europeans and eventually develop colonial empires of their own.

Here's how much both would've been able to initially conquer in the Pre-Colombian era :

althistmesomerica.png
 
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Malta

Ehhhh. The problem was they would more likely turn the weapons on themselves. Given that the Aztec Empire was really a power sharing hegemony and the Maya disparate city-states. Disease still would decimate their social order leading to the chaos and social collapse that really killed most Natives.

A TL featuring Cortes dieing in his expedition would do wonders without gunpowder. As the introduction of Gunpowder and especially cannons and what not would have totally shifted the culture and society of the Mesoamerican peoples in distinct ways that would probably spawn a in recognizable state in Mesoamerican that would possibly not be Mexica at all.

Granted, cannons would have been useful in wrecking Tarascan forts.
 

pompejus

I believe you need some pretty advanced metallurgical knowledge to make usable guns or cannons, something the Mesoamericans lacked.
 

PhoenicianLegacy

Banned
pompejus said:
I believe you need some pretty advanced metallurgical knowledge to make usable guns or cannons, something the Mesoamericans lacked.
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We all know how gunpowder was accidentally invented by a Tang-Dynasty alchemist searching for an immortality Elixir right? Well maybe a Mayan Shaman could done something similar.

Also, as I said before, the canons would be giant immobile limestone bricks. They'd also be very limited in battle, being good for only once or twice. For projectiles, Obsidian shards would be used.

In addition, the diseases that wiped out so many Mesoamericans would've only killed half as much, given the much more limited European presence.
 

pompejus

PhoenicianLegacy said:
Also, as I said before, the canons would be giant immobile limestone bricks. They'd also be very limited in battle, being good for only once or twice. For projectiles, Obsidian shards would be used.
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I am not sure that would work. Stone reacts very different to explosions than metal does. I fear (but to be fair am not certain), you can't make reliable cannons out of rock.
 

PhoenicianLegacy

Banned
pompejus said:
I am not sure that would work. Stone reacts very different to explosions than metal does. I fear (but to be fair am not certain), you can't make reliable cannons out of rock.
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They would be HUGE and extremely thick rocks at least 2-3 meters in diameter. For the powder, they won't use too much of it.

Since the Incans were better at metallurgy than their northern counterparts, perhaps they might have eventually created sufficient enough canons?
 
Fenrir_Angerboda

Fenrir_Angerboda

PhoenicianLegacy said:
We all know how gunpowder was accidentally invented by a Tang-Dynasty alchemist searching for an immortality Elixir right? Well maybe a Mayan Shaman could done something similar.

Also, as I said before, the canons would be giant immobile limestone bricks. They'd also be very limited in battle, being good for only once or twice. For projectiles, Obsidian shards would be used.

In addition, the diseases that wiped out so many Mesoamericans would've only killed half as much, given the much more limited European presence.
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where would you get the saltpeter? the Chilean source is too far away for both parties to discover and use.

as for a cannon, I'm not sure stone would work.
Wooden and leather cannons are possible, but seem unlikely in this setting.

I'm pretty sure this topic's been covered before, so there's someone who can say more.
 

PhoenicianLegacy

Banned
Fenrir_Angerboda said:
where would you get the saltpeter? the Chilean source is too far away for both parties to discover and use.

as for a cannon, I'm not sure stone would work.
Wooden and leather cannons are possible, but seem unlikely in this setting.

I'm pretty sure this topic's been covered before, so there's someone who can say more.
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There's many sources you could utilize for creating powder for firearms. One example they'd use is animal dung, since bee honey (an ingredient used in the first Chinese gunpowder) was not available in the new world. Dung is a potent source of ammonia and all you need to get charcoal (another source) is simply by burning wood. As for sulphur, they could easily gather it from avocado or nearby volcanoes.
 
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Ravenflight

There would be many things that they could do with gunpowder that woudln't need metals.

Early cannons (bombards) were often made of wood that had been wrapped in ropes. The Chinese had 'fire lances' which were basically a fire cracker on the end of a long stick - or 'here, have this stick of dynamite' kind of weapon.

Rockets are fairly easy to make without metals.

I'm sure without metals I would be able to generate all sorts of destructive weapons with what would be available to the meso-americans.

They were pretty smart people, so I have no doubt that they would be able to do the same.
 

PhoenicianLegacy

Banned
The most likely candidates to create gunpowder are the Mayans, since they were the ones with primitive science. I imagine gunpowder being accidentally created like how it was in China. During the late Middle Ages, Mayan civilization was in decline, so anyone obtaining gunpowder would end up bringing it back up on its feet.

The Mayans were also the first civilization encountered by the Conquistadors on the Yucatan peninsula and had they lost to the Mayans, it would sent European colonialism in the region to an abrupt end, meaning that Cortez may have never visited Tenochititlan and thus all the Mesoamerican gold would have never been brought back to Europe, delaying its economic domination of the world.

With Spain withdrawing from the stage, it would've seemed Portugal had the New world all to itself and Spanish will never become a global language without the colonialism.
 
Fenrir_Angerboda

Fenrir_Angerboda

PhoenicianLegacy said:
There's many sources you could utilize for creating powder for firearms. One example they'd use is animal dung, since bee honey (an ingredient used in the first Chinese gunpowder) was not available in the new world. Dung is a potent source of ammonia and all you need to get charcoal (another source) is simply by burning wood. As for sulphur, they could easily gather it from avocado or nearby volcanoes.
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Ravenflight said:
Out of the bottoms of these guys.
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alright, but how are they going to know what they need is in the guano, let alone what to mix it with?

We're looking at it in hindsight, the Aztecs and Mayans don't have a clue.
from what I do know, Aztec shamen are mixing herbs, a far cry from using guano, let alone knowing what it'll do.
 

Umbral

Its going to take a while from the discovery of gunpowder to the realization that you can weaponize it. I'd imagine itd be used in construction and whatever mining they did first.

However, gunpowder does not help with the main problem, the plagues. You can have as much gunpowder as you like, when any contact with the enemy results in 20-90 % of you population dropping dead, including your administration and executive...you're screwed. Also, there was the tactical problem of European sea superiority.
 

ingemann

Banned
A Mesoamerican discovery of gunpowder would be interesting, but it would have relative small military value. They would not be able to make guns and any cannons they would make, would be on the border of useless.But that doesn't mean that gunpowder would not have uses. You could make rockets and primitive grenade, both would have some, but limited military use. More important is that gunpowder could be used to dig holes or canyons though mountains, easing the transport, but also enable the Mesopotanian to transport water to new territories. So gunpowder, may enable the Mesopotanian to set up through unitarian empires up, rather than OTL glorified city state and vassals like the Aztec Empire.
 

Flocculencio

Donor
Ravenflight said:
There would be many things that they could do with gunpowder that woudln't need metals.

Early cannons (bombards) were often made of wood that had been wrapped in ropes. The Chinese had 'fire lances' which were basically a fire cracker on the end of a long stick - or 'here, have this stick of dynamite' kind of weapon.

Rockets are fairly easy to make without metals.

I'm sure without metals I would be able to generate all sorts of destructive weapons with what would be available to the meso-americans.

They were pretty smart people, so I have no doubt that they would be able to do the same.
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You're not working it out from first principles. They'll have to and it's next to impossible.
 

eliphas8

pompejus said:
I believe you need some pretty advanced metallurgical knowledge to make usable guns or cannons, something the Mesoamericans lacked.
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Well yeah but grenades thrown with a sling are easy to do and would use mostly existing technologies for the mesoamarican empires. It doesn't have to be cannons to be effective, just something workable. It's not gonna be a magic bullet but it would be a very effective tool on the parts of their military.

Also as was said above canons can be made of wood.
 
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