A belt-fed medium machine gun invented in 1884 by Hiram Stevens Maxim and is historically the earliest example for an recoil-operated (or fully automatic) gun, opposed to the manually operated gatling gun which has a handcrank for the user. It entered various armed conflicts since 1886, most notably the Two World Wars even until 21st century's Russo-Ukrainian war. Its tubular barrel shroud stores water for cooling the barrel.
The Maxim gun is usually mounted on wheeled carriages, vehicles, or tripods, and sometimes equipped with a shield. A single personnel can fire the weapon , but a crew was required to carry spare ammunition, water, and a target spotter.
This tag also applies to its Russian/Soviet counterpart chambered in 7.62×54mmR, the PM M1910. Do not use the tag on any machine gun with a water-cooling jacket on its barrel like the Schwarzlose machine gun and Browning M1917, and further research if the gun is a variant of the Maxim before tagging.
