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| Tiger (top) and Qilin (bottom) Mu Huo Shou, from 'Wu Bei Zhi (《武備志》)'. |
Mu Huo Shou (木火獸, lit. 'Wooden fire beast') was one of the weirder weapons of the Ming Dynasty, being a wooden pushcart with paper model of an animal—typically a tiger or
qilin—mounted on top. The paper animal was treated with fire retardant (i.e. potassium alum), and a flame throwing bamboo
Peng Tong (噴筒) and two smoke dispensers were hidden inside the "mouth" and "eyes" of the paper animal respectively. When the weapons were ignited, the pushcart looked like a terrifying fire-breathing monster from afar, since the soldier pushing the cart would be obscured by all the smoke and fire.
