Anyone studying military history and the history of warfare practices is called upon to become familiar with a series of variables specific to the subjects under study. There is a political situation, then the political-diplomatic game. In other circumstances, researchers will focus on socio-economic variables, which are another approach to our collective understanding of the armed conflict. More recently, over the past thirty years or so, cultural studies have become fashionable, with an analysis of "war cultures" that, on their own, encompassing all kinds of avenues of study, from psychology to the arts and mentalities.
Then there is this historically much more classical approach to war history in the analysis of the modus operandi of armed conflict, which simply consists of studying the material with which men kill each other. This is what we would like to elaborate on, by briefly addressing the history of weapons technology. Concrete, physical, raw, the tools with which men go to war are therefore subjects of history. In other words, they contribute to our understanding of the practices of war, their ins and outs, as they depend on the different contexts or ages without which a particular weapon could not have been manufactured.
However, the evolution of weapons technologies is not linear. At times, it was marked by rapid progress, while at other times and in other places, it seemed to stand still. This partly explains why armament, in itself, is not necessarily a guarantee of victory. Other factors inherent in warfare practices such as topography, morale, discipline, communications, and others must be taken into account. However, if the warlord goes into the field with the initial control of many of these elements, it is likely that his understanding of weapons technologies will be self-evident and will give him an additional asset to achieve victory, whether acquired by brute force or by the adversary's willingness to surrender.
The importance of armaments in military history varies from one perspective to another. Some researchers will say that weapons are at the heart of battles, while others will argue that they are not even an object of study, at least not from an academic point of view. Our view is that weapons technologies are important to consider in the outcome of battles, but they are not the only approach to a more general understanding of military history.
In the field, history has also shown the ambivalent nature of the relationship between technology and the outcome of combat. It is worth noting that Western civilization (let us say Western Europe since the Renaissance) was able to largely dominate the world thanks to a technological superiority that allowed it to produce weapons of superior quality. Nevertheless, the military successes achieved in part through these weapons remain relative and ephemeral, as many Western military commanders were resistant to technological change. This highlights another important element to consider, namely that even if it appears minimal by our standards, the slightest technological innovation of the past has had major impacts for contemporaries.
What are weapons?
Weapons are all those instruments, means or machines used to attack or defend oneself.
The word weapon comes from the Latin, "armus, arma, armi", which means arm and weapon, as it happens with the English word arm. It is understood, indeed, that the first idea of weapon was confused with that of supplementary arm or extension of the arm of the user.
How did weapons arise, why do they exist and how have they influenced the History of Humanity?
They were born out of the need of our most remote ancestors to protect themselves from the attacks of animals and of their peers and to attack them in turn. There is no doubt in my mind that weapons, today so discredited and the creation of fire at will, were the most important instruments in human history.
Without the weapons, the primitive phytophagous man would not have been able to pass to the superior category of the hunter (instead of that of prey, as it was before). And, as the regime of life they led forced them to ingest a large number of plants, which they had to eat raw like the pieces they hunted, their digestions were almost always very painful; when they knew how to light the fire at will and manipulate their food by roasting or cooking, taking advantage of the nutritional quality of vegetables and fresh game meats, softening them and eliminating more or less toxic materials, they managed to improve their material and intellectual life, driving themselves to perfection.
Thus, the weapons that made hunting possible, and the creation of fire at will, were the greatest discoveries or achievements of Prehistory and the origin of technique and civilization, in a very slow process that lasted thousands of years. The truth is that with weapons man became a hunter and acquired security and confidence in his own physical and intellectual forces. He began to be "the King of Creation", as it was said in the old texts of natural history. And so he was able to enter into the most remote and basic of cultures, into that of hunters.