Was artillery used in the field?

[Endre Fodstad]

But if you were to roll this up to a fortification, it would scare the crap out of anyone trying to defend it, if it didn't turn them into toast!

Or if they didn't drop a couple of big rocks, water, oil, lime, or some other fun stuff, into the cauldron, frying of boiling the crew like ancient KFC! Or - I know! Block its path with something! Or pepper the bellows area with arrows - a few of those into the leather bellows'll really reduce their draft a bit.

I have to admit that such a device always struck me as sort of fanciful. It reminds me of reading the King's Mirror and looking at the list of amazingly interesting names of siege and ship warfare equipment the author lists - while it might certainly sound fun to have a big beam on top of a castle wall with a hook at the end that can pick up individual storming soldiers and fling them into the air, the practicality of such devices sounds....doubtful (check out http://www.mediumaevum.com/75years/mirr ... html#XXXIX and http://www.mediumaevum.com/75years/mirr ... tml#XXXVII - the literal translation of "war-beam" in the naval section is "crooked shield-jotun/troll -whatever the heck that means)