03-29-2017, 10:27 AM
(03-28-2017, 09:41 PM)Nathan Ross Wrote: Does anyone have any notion of the range of a late Roman onager catapult? Is there any evidence about the size of the larger versions, and what weight of projectile they might have used?
There's apparently a note in Joshua Stylites that a catapult at the siege of Amida in AD502-3 threw stones of 135kg (presumably a conversion from whatever unit of measurement Joshua was using!) - how large would a machine like this need to be, and how far might it have been able to throw these missiles?
According to this Article at: http://www.romanarmy.net/pdf/Qasr%20Ibri...0Balls.pdf
Vespasians artillery at Jotapata 69AD fired stone balls weighing one Talent (34kg? I'm not sure about conversion weights here)
Vitruvius Pollio in Book 10 of his books on Architecture gives some interesting measurements the largest of which is for a 360 Ib Stone thrower: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text...ection%3D3
This would be a sandstone ball about 20 inches or so in Diameter....
Ivor
"And the four bare walls stand on the seashore. a wreck a skeleton a monument of that instability and vicissitude to which all things human are subject. Not a dwelling within sight, and the farm labourer, and curious traveller, are the only persons that ever visit the scene where once so many thousands were congregated." T.Lewin 1867
"And the four bare walls stand on the seashore. a wreck a skeleton a monument of that instability and vicissitude to which all things human are subject. Not a dwelling within sight, and the farm labourer, and curious traveller, are the only persons that ever visit the scene where once so many thousands were congregated." T.Lewin 1867
