User:KDS4444/Time for a new article on the word "Breech"

The term breech usually refers to an element of the design of a cannon or gun describing the mass of solid metal located directly behind the bottom of the bore and extending to but not including the base of the breech  It is the breech that receives the brunt of the force of the pressurized gas when an explosive charge is ignited inside the cannon's chamber, and it is the element opposite which the expanding gas pushes the cannon's projectile as the latter moves down the bore and out of the muzzle. The breech is often considered in opposition to the cannon's muzzle, the breech being the place where the explosive event begins and reaches its climax and the muzzle where it effectively ends (though the projectile, of course, continues, but this event is one of constant deceleration rather than explosive acceleration). Any cannon, gun, or firearm can be described as either breech-loading or muzzle-loading](there are no other types).

The term breech may also refer to a portion of the firearm action of a small arms or artillery weapon that must be opened to receive a cartridge and closed/ sealed in order to fire one. This opening and closing is often achieved with a breechblock.

By the time of the early revolver, the breech had come to refer to the entire piece of metal surrounding the chamber rather than to just the metal behind it.

Unlike virtually all traditional cannon, which were muzzle loaded, many of the bombards loaded at the breech