SHIMOGA, INDIA—According to an AFP report, a stockpile of more than 1,000 corroded eighteenth-century rockets has been found in an abandoned well in southern India. State assistant director of archaeology R. Shejeshwara Nayaka said the weapons, known as Mysorean rockets, were cylindrical iron tubes that contained propellant and black powder, and were developed by Tipu Sultan, ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore. This cache of weapons is thought to have belonged to Tipu Sultan himself, who was killed in 1799 during the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War while fighting against the British East India Company. “Digging of the dry well where its mud was smelling like gunpowder led to the discovery of the rockets and shells in a pile,” Nayaka said. Tipu Sultan’s rockets are said to have been the first weapon of their kind, and to have influenced the development of the Congreve rocket, which was employed by the British during the Napoleonic Wars. For more, go to “Letter from India: Living Heritage at Risk.”
