Hello~ Everyone:

The attached file is famous "Enjoying the Lantern Festival for Ming Xianzong"（明憲宗元宵行樂圖）,in this picture we can find people set off rocket（沖天炮）and fire-lance（萬花筒？）for fun. Since this picture was painted at about AD 1475, so I think it's a strong evidence for the existence of military rocket in Ming Dynasty, isn't it?

p.s. Who can tell me how to get the higher resolution version of that picture? I hope I can read it more detail, thank you all!

(1) There are evidence to suggest that military rockets have been used as far back as the Song dynasty.
(2) Don't you think it is a little far fetch to take a festival-item and imply it was used in the military ?

Rockets were used in Chinese warfare by about 1206, according to the book I have. The Ming clearly made heavy use of military rockets, for example in the rocket-propelled arrow battery called the huoche (hwacha in Korean).

The painting is interesting, though, and I would also like to see a more detailed version of it.

Hmmm....As I known before,"Huo-Chan or fire-lance"（火槍）was first used by Chen-Gui（陳規）in 1132, I can't believe that rocket was invented before 1132.
In my point of view, the "Huo-Jian"（火箭）in 12th century could be "arrows attached by gunpowder", so "Fei-Huo Chiang"（飛火槍）could also be fire-lance only.
I still believe real rockets were first record by "Huo-Long Jin"（火龍經） in 15th century.

You are correct in saying that the earliest military rockets were 'rocket-arrows', while the first rocket-propelled winged 'flying bombs' are described in the Huolong Jing of 1412. The rocket-propelled bombs definitely qualify to be military rockets. So the issue here would be whether you consider the earlier rocket-propelled arrows to be military rockets or just enhanced arrows.