This place of strength vvas furnished of sixe great peeces, demi-Culuerins, and Sakers, vvhich shot directlie in front vpon vs as vve approched. Novve vvithout this vval vpon the inner side of the streight, they had brought likevvise tvvo great Gallies vvith their provvesse to the shore, hauing planted in them eleuen peeces of ordinance vvhich did beate all crosse the straight, and flanked our comming on.
Walter Bigges. A Svmmarie and Trve Discovrse of Sir Frances Drakes VVest Indian Voyage (1589)
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it was easy to see what she was doing, and hear what she was saying in the lower room where she lived; and often the king derived much amusement from the antics of the old girl, who did not know that she was so much within the range of his majesty's culverin.
Honoré de Balzac. Droll Stories
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And being no stranger to the art of war, I gave him a description of cannons, culverins, muskets, carabines, pistols, bullets, powder, swords, bayonets, battles, sieges, retreats, attacks, undermines, countermines, bombardments, sea fights, ships sunk with a thousand men, twenty thousand killed on each side, dying groans, limbs flying in the air, smoke, noise, confusion, trampling to death under horses’ feet, flight, pursuit, victory; fields strewed with carcases,
Jonathan Swift. Gulliver's Travels Into Several Remote Regions of the World (1726)