History
Although breech-loading weapons were developed as far back as the late 14th century in Burgundy, breech-loading became more successful with improvements in precision engineering and machining in the 19th century.
The main challenge for developers of breech-loading weapons was sealing the breech. This was eventually solved for smaller weapons by the development of the self-contained metallic cartridge. For weapons too large to use cartridges, the problem was solved by the development of the interrupted screw.
Read more about this topic: Breech-loading Weapon
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