Zamzama cannon cast by an Armenian gunsmith, Armenians in India

Kim is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning English author Rudyard Kipling. The story unfolds against the backdrop of the Great Game, the political conflict between Russia and Britain in Central Asia.

The gun in front of the Lahore Museum described in the first chapter is an existing piece called Zamzama, sometimes referred to as Kim’s gun.

According to Seth in his book, Armenians in India, 115-8, 128, the famous Zamzam gun featured in Kipling’s Kim was cast by an Armenian gun-maker Shah Nazar Khan in 1757 during the Durrani-era for Ahmad Shah Abdali.

Quote from the book, “He sat in defiance of municipal orders, astride the gun Zam-Zammeh, on her old platform, opposite the old Ajaibgher, the Wonder House, as the natives called the Lahore Museum.”

By Mano Chil

Related links: Замзама – Армянское чудо-орудие в пакистанском городе Лахор