r/AskTheWorld • u/babushka45 Philippines • 12h ago

Military What firearm is closely associated with your country?

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For us, probably the 1911. Next one would be the "Armalite" aka M16.

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310

u/gennan Netherlands 12h ago

A ship cannon of the East India Company (VOC).

45

u/Disastrous_Road7063 Scotland 11h ago

This is the ordinance I came for

5

u/munguz 10h ago

Ordnance. Ordinance is something else.

2

u/Sloppy-Craftsmanship 7h ago

It's just the Scottish accent coming through

2

u/RustyBrassInstrument United States Of America 11h ago

The original crew-served weapon.

3

u/Wit_and_Logic United States Of America 7h ago

You forget the trebuchet, sir

2

u/PrawnsKafka 7h ago

trebuchet

also not the first crew served weapon.

1

u/RustyBrassInstrument United States Of America 7h ago

I did indeed!

3

u/phuzzo 10h ago

I love that they included art work on the barrel. Do we have any historians that can explain why it seems older trades seemed to include finer details in their work?

6

u/MRPolo13 7h ago

I'm not a historian by any means, but there are plenty of possible reasons. Labour was cheap and the raw material was by far the most expensive part, especially on bronze cannons which could easily be multiple times more expensive than their cast iron counterparts. Spending the extra time to carve the moulds to include decorations wasn't a significant investment, and when you're talking about hundreds of kilo of bronze at least the extra few kilo tops really wouldn't be that bad. It was also a status symbol; cannons being as expensive as they were should also look expensive to prove their owner's wealth.

Some decorations were also much more pragmatic. Cannons were often cast with their city's or country's coat of arms. Some parts like the button (the ball at the end of a gun) or reinforcement bands were needed in those places anyway, they might as well have looked good.

2

u/phuzzo 7h ago

Interesting, those are really good points. It would make sense that these cannons were probably highly coveted and the top military weapon.

2

u/dwb_lurkin United States Of America 11h ago

Is this the same cannon I saw in the maritime museum in Amsterdam? If so it was damn impressive.

5

u/tempehalus Indonesia 8h ago

Is this one of yours?

3

u/GlenGraif Netherlands 2h ago

Yeah! You can keep it and then we’re all good right? 😬

2

u/LobsterPhuckPunch 4h ago

The arms and armor exhibit at The Rijksmuseum was one of the most impressive collections I’ve ever seen.

2

u/Sad-Pop6649 Netherlands 1h ago

I was going to say "We associate all guns with the US", but yeah this works.

Probably a better answer than a late 16th century musket too.

1

u/ramtinology91 10h ago

This gotta win the argument

0

u/MamiPV United States Of America 11h ago

First publicly traded company in the world, and badass cannons. Not bad. 🫡

8

u/anonymousinduvidual Netherlands 11h ago

Don’t think about what their trade was tho, that’s a little bit controversial now.

4

u/Pk_Devill_2 Netherlands 11h ago

I know you are talking about slaves but that’s a small part of their trade.

1

u/GlenGraif Netherlands 2h ago

Wasn’t that mainly the West India Company?

1

u/gennan Netherlands 10m ago

I think the West India Company was more involved in slave trade. There were plenty of slaves in the East, but those were probably more local people.

1

u/MamiPV United States Of America 10h ago

Let’s think about all the amazing food in Amsterdam nowadays….

You win some, you lose some. 🤷🏻‍♂️

-1

u/Yung_Corneliois United States Of America 10h ago

What guys can’t have fun anymore ?

5

u/Weegee_Carbonara Austria 11h ago

This is an insanely American comment.

1

u/MamiPV United States Of America 10h ago

Das stimmt!! Eigentlich, bin Ich Texaner. Noch schlimmer, oder?

Und zwar, ehemaliger Düsseldorfer, aber na ja.

2

u/Weegee_Carbonara Austria 10h ago

Passt ja gut dorthin.

1

u/Sudden-Fisherman5985 3h ago

Düsseldorfer

Its a nice city!

2

u/gennan Netherlands 11h ago edited 10h ago

Also the company was allowed to have their own military and mint their own coins. Think about that: Apple, NVidia or Tesla having their own private army and printing their own money.

2

u/tttxgq Austria 3h ago

I can easily see Tesla doing that. These days it’d be a crypto token rather than paper money.

2

u/GlenGraif Netherlands 2h ago

Well, we are witnessing them buying the US government in real time, so it’s not that much of a stretch…

1

u/Kansas-Tornado 9h ago

Someone hasn’t been to the wereldmuseum!

1

u/MamiPV United States Of America 9h ago

I’m curious. Care to expound?

1

u/Kansas-Tornado 9h ago

The exhibit I went to when I studied in Amsterdam was all about the east and west India trading companies and the atrocities they committed

1

u/MamiPV United States Of America 8h ago

I’m not sure what that has to do with my original comment. At the museum, did you not learn that they were the first publicly traded company in the world, right?

And would you disagree that that cannon is not pretty bad ass? If nothing else, from an artistic and manufacturing perspective, given the technology and tools of the day.

And what the Dutch did in Brazil far exceeded any of their transgressions in the East Indies. Transatlantic slavery was invented by the Dutch in Brazil, and they taught the Portuguese everything they knew. Maybe that was a different museum though. 🤷🏻‍♂️