Howitzer groups called batteries. The English word ""howitzer"" comes from the Czech word ""houfnice"", from "houf", "crowd", and "houf" is in turn a borrowing from the Middle High German word "Hūfe" or "Houfe" (modern German "Haufen"), meaning "heap". "Haufen", sometimes in the compound "Gewalthaufen", also designated a pike square formation in German. In the Hussite Wars of the 1420s and 1430s, the Czechs used short barreled ""houfnice"" cannons to fire at short distances into crowds of infantry, or into charging heavy cavalry, to make horses shy away. The word was rendered into German as "aufeniz" in the earliest attested use in
Type 88 75 mm AA gun of Japan. In the early phases of World War II, Allied military intelligence initially assumed that the Japanese Type 88 was a copy of the formidable German Flak 36/37 88 mm gun due to its name. However, there is no connection between the two weapons. The confusion arose from the Japanese Army's nomenclature system. “Type 88” corresponds to the year 2588 in the Japanese imperial year, and not to the caliber of the weapon. The Type 88 75 mm AA gun had a single piece gun barrel with sliding breech, mounted on a central pedestal. The firing platform was supported