Triple-barrelled cannon found in Croatian fort is 'machine gun' forerunner designed by Da Vinci R

It was my intention to place this in the 'breaking news' forum, however in light of the tightening of guidelines and the fact the 'post news' link just 404's for me I thought it would be best suited here.

daily mail article

When an ancient three-barrelled cannon was discovered by schoolchildren, museum officials would have known they had stumbled on a rare find. But now, 40 years after the discovery of the unique weapon, they have learned just how important it is - the gun is a prototype designed by Leonardo Da Vinci himself. The cannon was discovered in a Croatian fort, but only now has it been confirmed it was designed more than 500 years ago by the artist and inventor. Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk...

Weapon of war: This triple barrel cannon designed by Leonardo Da Vinci was found in a 15th century fort in Croatia Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk...

Invention: The multi-barrelled machine gun was a weapon with remarkable firepower. Da Vinci sketched this rolling artillery battery around 1480 Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk...

A typical cannon of Da Vinci's age was cast iron or bronze, had a short barrel, a short range and fired cannonballs which fitted very approximately. The first thing he did was to design breech-loading cannons as against muzzle-loading. They required a fast means of being cooled before another firing and he calculated that a vat of water would do the trick. During these tests he even managed to launch a rocket-powered cannon-ball 10,000 feet into the air. The steam cannon was another experiment. To be manufactured from copper, the breech of the canon would be built into a brazier of burning coals which would heat it to very high temperatures. Following this, a small amount of water would be injected just behind the iron ball. When the water turned to steam it would drive the ball out under pressure. Given that Da Vinci even quoted how large a cannonball this weapon could fire, and how far it would travel, it is quite feasible that it was actually built and test-fired. He wanted to increase the rate of firing weapons and so designed machines with multiple cannons, so they could be fired successively or all together. Two of these used racks of eleven or fourteen guns. While the top row was being fired the next rack was loaded; at the same time, a third rack was cooling off. Leonardo was the first to measure the penetrating power of a missile, and to ascertain how to vary it by changing the attitude. Leonardo also wanted to have more effective projectiles. In attempting to do this he designed shells filled with gunpowder which exploded upon impact. Others contained projectiles which would scatter over the area. One design saw a large ball split into two pieces as it left the mortar. This sent smaller balls in all directions and they, in turn, exploded upon contact. Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk...

I have quoted heavily from the source material because my 'conspiracy' thoughts on this subject are that the inventions and 'futuretech' that Da vinci is credited with must mean a knowledge of the future to my mind. Is it credible to suggest otherwise? From items such as the helicopter to this machine gun design, and all of the other drawings and inventions credited to Da Vinci it seems he has set eyes upon the versions of these designs we use in the present day.

can anyone suggest an alternative to either

a) some form of actual time travel

b) some form of future visions that were accurate and detailed enough for Da Vinci to be able to develop designs for items that he saw.

I cannot conceive that so many inventions which are used by humanity now are the product of one man's imagination. One, maybe two I could accept, but the plethora we see?!?