Leonardo da Vinci designed an organ gun, a multi-barrel cannon with barrels mounted together for repeated fire.
The weapon took its name from the visual resemblance between its parallel barrels and the pipes of a musical organ. Leonardo’s version arranged many small cannons on a frame or platform, allowing a group to fire in sequence or together. The goal was to improve battlefield firepower while reducing the delay between shots.
An organ gun was not a modern machine gun. Each barrel still required loading and ignition, and early gunpowder weapons were slow, smoky, and difficult to handle. Leonardo’s proposal therefore represents an attempt at volley fire rather than fully automatic firing.
The design is distinct from his three-row cannon sketches, although both used multiple barrels.