The history of naval artillery is a long and complex one and this highly-illustrated, single-volume work sets out to present a coherent story which will appeal both to the enthusiast as well as to the scholar and expert. It starts with the earliest guns, the bronze-cast cannon, which were cast employing the same technology as used for making church bells. A plethora of guns were soon to develop and along with them a multiplicity of names: basilisk, bombard, culverin, drake, minion, saker, passavolante, serpentine, and many others. By the end of the seventeenth century this muzzle-loading, smoothbore weapon had pretty well reached the zenith of its development and not until the introduction of armour and the explosive shell in the nineteenth century was there any fundamental change. With the development of breech loading and rifled barrels the rate of fire, range and accuracy improved dramatically. Today the navies of the world have fully automatic guns which load, train, lay and fire themselves with deadly accuracy. The author describes all these developments using examples of extant weapons which can be found in military and naval museums around the world, at memorial sites and monuments, and in private collections and museum ships. Russian and Soviet ships' guns have been included, as have shore defence weapons. The text contains descriptions of 275 naval guns, and photographs have been complemented by barrel diagrams and other contemporary drawings and sketches. It also provides a guide to their whereabouts in the world's museums.