List of the largest cannon by caliber

Early 15th-century Flemish supergun Dulle Griet at Ghent (caliber of 660 mm)

The list of cannons by caliber contains all types of cannons through the ages listed in decreasing caliber size. For the purpose of this list, the development of superguns can be divided into three periods, based on the kind of projectiles used:

• Stone balls: Cannon of extraordinary bore, which fired stone balls, were first introduced at the turn of the 14th to 15th century in Western Europe. Following a logic of increasing performance through size, they had evolved from small handguns to giant wrought-iron or cast-bronze bombards within a span of just several decades.^[1]
• Iron balls and shot: By the 16th century, however, a general switch from stone balls to smaller, but much more effective iron projectiles was in full swing. This and the parallel tendency towards standardized, rapid-firing cannon made the enormously costly and logistically demanding superguns soon obsolete in the European theatre (with the exception of the odd showpiece).^[2]
• Explosive shells: In the industrial age, artillery was again revolutionized by the introduction of explosive shells, beginning with the Paixhans guns. Breakthroughs in metallurgy and modes of production were followed up by new experimentation with super-sized caliber weapons, culminating in the steel colossi of the two World Wars. In the post-war era, the development of extremely overpowered artillery was gradually abandoned in favour of missile technology, while heavy guns are still demanded by various arms of the service.

As artillery pieces of the different periods, due to the dissimilar characteristics of their projectiles, are practically incommensurable in terms of their bore size, the following list is split into three sections.

Cannon by caliber

Stone balls

Heyday: 15th to 16th centuries

	Caliber (mm)	Name	Type	Produced	Place of origin	Made by
	890[CB 1]	Tsar Cannon	Bombard	1586	Tsardom of Russia	Andrey Chokhov
	820[CB 2][3]	Pumhart von Steyr	Bombard	Early 15th century	House of Habsburg,  Holy Roman Empire
	745[CB 3]	Basilic	Bombard	1453	Ottoman Empire/ Wallachia	Orban
	735[CB 4][6]	Faule Mette	Bombard	1411	City of Brunswick,  Holy Roman Empire	Henning Bussenschutte
	700	Malik-i-Maidan	Bombard	1549	City of Bijapur	Muhammad Bin Husain Rumi
	660[7]	Dulle Griet	Bombard	First half of 15th century	City of Ghent,  Holy Roman Empire
	635[8]	Dardanelles Gun or Great Turkish Bombard	Bombard	1464	Ottoman Empire	Munir Ali
	520[9]	Faule Grete	Bombard	1409	Monastic state of the Teutonic Knights	Heynrich Dumechen
	520[10]	Mons Meg	Bombard	1449	Duchy of Burgundy,  Holy Roman Empire	Jehan Cambier
	510[CB 5][11]		Bombard	1480	Knights Hospitaller

Iron balls and shot

Heyday: 16th to 19th centuries

	Caliber (mm)	Name	Type	Produced	Place of origin	Made by
	280[12]	Kanone Greif	Scharfmetze ("medium size")	1524	Electorate of Trier	Master Simon
	280	Jaivana		1720	State of Jaipur
	286	Dal Madal Kaman/Dala Mardana		1565[13][14]	Mallabhum (Bishnupur Kingdom)	Jagannath Karmakar
		Jahan Kosha Cannon		1637[15][16]		Janardan Karmakar
	240	Zamzama		1757	Durrani Empire	Shah Nazir

Twenty-inch (508 mm) Rodman and Dahlgren smoothbore cannons were cast in 1864 during the American Civil War. The Rodmans were used as seacoast defense. Although not used as intended, 2-20" Dahlgrens were intended to be mounted in the turrets of USS Dictator and USS Puritan.

Explosive shells

Heyday: 19th to 20th centuries

	Caliber (mm)	Name	Type	Produced	Place of origin	Made by
	914	Mallet's mortar	Mortar	1857	United Kingdom	Robert Mallet
	914	Little David	Mortar	1945	United States
	800	Schwerer Gustav	Railway gun	1941	Nazi Germany	Krupp
	800	Dora	Railway gun	1942	Nazi Germany	Krupp
	600[17][18]	Mortier monstre	Mortar	1832	France	Henri-Joseph Paixhans
	600 (later, 540)	Karl-Gerät	Mortar	1940	Nazi Germany	Rheinmetall
	520	Obusier de 520 modèle 1916	Railway howitzer	1918	France	Schneider et Cie
	460	40 cm/45 Type 94	Naval gun	1940	Empire of Japan	Kure Naval Arsenal
	457.2	BL 18 inch railway howitzer	Railway howitzer	1920	United Kingdom	Elswick Ordnance Company
	457.2	BL 18 inch Mk I naval gun	Naval gun	1916	United Kingdom	Elswick Ordnance Company
	450	RML 17.72 inch gun	Naval gun	1877	United Kingdom	Elswick Ordnance Company
	420	Big Bertha	Howitzer		German Empire	Krupp
	420	42 cm Gamma Mörser	Mortar		German Empire /  Nazi Germany	Krupp
	420	2B1 Oka	Howitzer	1957	Soviet Union
	412.8	BL 16.25 inch Mk I naval gun	Naval gun	1888	United Kingdom	Elswick Ordnance Company
	410	41 cm/45 3rd Year Type	Naval gun		Empire of Japan
	406	16"/50 caliber M1919 gun	Gun	1920	United States	Watervliet Arsenal
	406	16"/50 caliber Mark 2 gun	Gun	1920	United States	Washington Navy Yard, Washington, D.C., Bethlehem Steel
	406	BL 16 inch Mk I naval gun	Naval gun	1927	United Kingdom
	406	40.6 cm SK C/34 gun	Naval gun		Nazi Germany	Krupp
	406	2A3 Kondensator 2P	Howitzer	1956	Soviet Union
	406	406 mm/50 B-37 naval gun for Sovetsky Soyuz-class battleships	Naval gun	1937	Soviet Union	Barrikady Plant, Stalingrad
	406	16"/50 caliber Mark 7 gun for the Iowa-class battleships	Naval gun	1943	United States	Washington Navy Yard, Washington, D.C.

See also

• List of artillery
• List of cannons by range
• M65 Atomic Cannon

Notes

1. The bombard has a conical bore of 82.5–90 cm.
2. The bombard has a conical bore of 76–88 cm.
3. Bown^[4] indicates a larger bore of 36 in (914 mm), but Hollenback^[5] says that Kritoboulos, a contemporary source, indicates a circumference of 12 spans and concludes that in this case the smallest of three possible sizes of span is the correct unit, giving 0.745 m for the bore. Hollenback also notes that granite cannonballs dating from the siege of Constantinople had a diameter of 0.711  and could have been shot from this weapon using a wooden sabot.
4. The bombard has a conical bore of 67–80 cm.
5. The bombard has a conical bore of 45–58 cm.

Footnotes

1. Schmidtchen 1977b, pp. 228–230
2. Schmidtchen 1977a, pp. 153–161
3. Schmidtchen 1977a, p. 162; ball diameter is 20 mm less (p. 171, Fn. 41).
4. Stephen R. Bown (2005). A Most Damnable Invention: Dynamite, Nitrates, and the Making of the Modern World. Penguin Group. ISBN 0-670-04524-1.
5. George M. Hollenback (2002), "Notes on the Design and Construction of Urban's Giant Bombard", Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 26 (1): 284–291
6. Schmidtchen 1977b, p. 222; ball diameter is 20 mm less (p. 171, Fn. 41).
7. Schmidtchen 1977a, p. 164; ball diameter is 20 mm less (p. 171, Fn. 41).
8. Royal Armouries
9. Schmidtchen 1977b, p. 218; ball diameter is 20 mm less (p. 171, Fn. 41).
10. Schmidtchen 1977a, p. 166; ball diameter is 20 mm less (p. 171, Fn. 41).
11. Schmidtchen 1977b, p. 236, Fn. 103
12. Archiv für die Officiere der Königlich Preußischen Artillerie- und Ingenieur-Korps, Vol. 19, Berlin, Posen, Bromberg 1846, p. 101
13. Dasgupta 2009, p. 55.
15. Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh: Humanities, Volumes 36-38 Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, 1991
16. The Land of the rupee Bennett, Coleman, 1912, the University of Michigan
17. Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon, Vol. 14, Leipzig 1908, p. 160: "Mörser": caliber of 60 cm
18. Journal des Sciences Militaires, 2nd series, Vol. 22, Paris 1838: caliber of 22 pouces = 59,6 cm (p. 49); outer diameter of the barrel: 1 m (p. 54)

References

• Schmidtchen, Volker (1977a), "Riesengeschütze des 15. Jahrhunderts. Technische Höchstleistungen ihrer Zeit", Technikgeschichte 44 (2): 153–173
• Schmidtchen, Volker (1977b), "Riesengeschütze des 15. Jahrhunderts. Technische Höchstleistungen ihrer Zeit", Technikgeschichte 44 (3): 213–237
• Dasgupta, Gautam Kumar; Biswas, Samira,; Mallik, Rabiranjan, (2009), Heritage Tourism: An Anthropological Journey to Bishnupur, A Mittal Publication, p. 55, ISBN 8183242944