In 1492, Lorenzo de’ Medici owned just five portable firearms, which literature of the era routinely dismissed as the unchivalrous, devilish work of cowards. By 1539, his descendant Cosimo had stocked ninety-one firearms in his Florentine storerooms as recurring foreign wars forced the peninsula to abandon mercenaries for citizen militias. Civic authorities instituted mandatory monthly target practice and armed ten percent of their newly formed infantry with early handguns. A weapon once considered dishonorable quickly became a staple of municipal defense.
The shift shows how rapidly practical military necessity can override entrenched cultural prejudice, even among an artistic elite. Yet because the transition happened before the rise of ordinary soldiers' memoirs, we are left mostly with the records of state arsenals rather than the personal views of the men ordered to carry them. It is a reminder that technological adoption is rarely smooth, usually driven less by enthusiasm than by the grim pressure of survival.
more: https://aeon.co/essays/the-renaissance-gun-from-diabolical-device-to-popular-militias
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