• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
Zippy Facts Logo

Zippy Facts

Interesting Random Facts

  • Animals
  • Culture
  • Firsts
  • Food
  • Geography
  • Health
  • History
  • Inventions
  • Language
  • Mythology
  • Odds
  • People
  • Religion
  • Science
  • Space
  • Universe
  • World
You are here: Home / Accomplishments / Who Invented Gunpowder and When?

Who Invented Gunpowder and When?

March 2, 2020 by Karen Hill

The Chinese invented gunpowder during the 9th century.

Europeans didn’t learn about gunpowder until Italian merchants visited China about 500 years later. Gunpowder explodes only if touched by flame. It can be used for simple cannons and guns but cannot blast out the inside of a mountain to make a railroad tunnel.

The world had to wait another 600 years for the invention of an explosive powerful enough to move mountains, blast out huge holes, and, unfortunately, destroy whole cities.

The new explosive was invented in 1846 by an Italian, Ascanio Sobrero, who was so frightened of his invention that he asked the world to forget about it. It was called nitroglycerine, and it was exploded by hitting or shaking it.

Drop a tiny bottle of the oily liquid on the floor, and an entire building would be blown to dust. Twenty years later, Alfred Nobel, a Swede, blended the strange oil with a type of absorbent earth called diatomaceous earth and created dynamite.

Related Facts

  • Who Invented the Bathtub and When Was the First Modern Bathtub Invented?
  • Who invented Scratch and Sniff ads and How do they put the smell into scratch and sniff advertising?
  • Who invented the pedal trash can and electric mixer and when?
  • Who Invented Steel and when was it first Discovered and Produced?
  • How Did the Jukebox Get its Name and and When Was the First Jukebox Invented?
  • How Do Scientists Determine the Temperature of Stars and Planets and Who Invented the Spectroscope?

Filed Under: Accomplishments

About Karen Hill

Karen Hill is a freelance writer, editor, and columnist. Born in New York, her work has appeared in the Examiner, Yahoo News, Buzzfeed, among others.

Previous Post: « Who Made The Terracotta Warriors In China?
Next Post: Who Invented Magnetic Levitation Trains? »

Footer

Follow

  • Facebook
  • Flickr
  • GitHub
  • Google+
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Medium
  • Pinterest
  • StumbleUpon
  • Tumblr
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Categories

Accomplishments Animals Culture Firsts Food Geography Health History Inventions Language Mythology Odds People Religion Science Space Universe World Your Body

About

Zippy Facts empowers the world by serving educational content that is accessible to everyone.

A tribute to growing up, zippyfacts.com showcases interesting and unusual facts about the world.

Our mission is to use technology to facilitate knowledge transfer and sharing.

Copyright © 2021 Zippy Facts

  • About Us
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy