Supergun

A supergun is an extraordinarily large artillery piece. This size may be due to a large bore, barrel length, or a combination of the two. While early examples tended to have a fairly short range, more recent examples have sometimes had an extremely high muzzle velocity, resulting in a very long range.

Depending on the design, they may be used to destroy heavy fortifications or bombard an enemy from extremely long range.

Gunpowder age

In the context of late medieval siege warfare the term superguns is sometimes applied to stone-firing bombards with a ball diameter of more than 50 cm. These superguns were either manufactured by forging together longitudinal iron bars, held in place by iron rings, or cast in bronze with techniques generally similar to bellfounding. Known examples include the Pumhart von Steyr, Dulle Griet and Mons Meg (all iron) as well as the cast-bronze Faule Mette, Faule Grete and Dardanelles Gun.

At the beginning of the development of superguns was the desire to increase the effect of the projectiles. To this end, master gunners first simply used larger powder loads. These, however, exerted larger pressure on the existing cannon and could make it burst, causing the death of the irreplaceable gunner with his crew (and even kings). In addition, it was observed that, due to their higher velocity, stone balls were shattered by the impact on the walls rather than smashing them. Thus, the mass of the cannonballs and, consequently, of the ordnance, also, continually increased, culminating in giant cannon like the Pumhart von Steyr which fired a 690 kg ball. Apart from the anticipated improvement in penetrating power, other factors such as prestige and a potential deterrent effect also played an important role.