Abstract
Battlewagons are one the most important land-based weapons after the invention of firearms. In Ming Dynasty, metal-made firearms were widely issued to the regular army. For the purposes of fire power support, anti-calvary, defend the passes and cities, transportation of heavy equipments, protection of loggers, and guarding the builders of the Great Walls, the Ming Army had built a great variety of specialized battlewagons. However, an error made during the writing of the Mingshi Bingzhi（the Treatises on military affairs in the History of the Ming dynasty, 明史兵志）, resulted in the comment that Ming's battlewagons were "useless and not used in battles.” As a result, future military historians failed to take this weapon into consideration. This research starts with a literature review. We investigate the cause of errors with the official histories such as the Mingshi Bingzhi. We then reviewed the records regarding battlewagons and their sources. At the end, we used the Ming Shilu（Veritable Records of the Ming Dynasty, 明實錄）as the starting point to reconstruct the historical evolution of Ming Dynasty's use of battlewagons. And selected materials from various sources, such as petitions, discussions, collected works, books on the art of war, Grand Secretariat Archives, local chronicles, unofficial histories, and some monographs on firearms history. We found that not only the Ming Empire used battlewagons; the Manchurians also used battlewagons frequently during Ming-Qing conflicts. Some defected Ming commanders were skillful in using battlewagons. In certain battles, the Manchurians even launched more battlewagons than the Ming Army ever did. Ever since the 1980s, a new generation of military history scholars emerged. However, their discussions with Chinese firearms are generally not supported by Chinese historical sources. Many of them adopted the erroneous view by the Mingshi Bingzhi. This study shall provide certain insight into the use of battlewagons and firearm of Ming Dynasty.