Pilum versus Ballista - Skull Evidence

[Nerva]

Ok, the skulls were Sheep skulls, don't know how long they we're dead but luckily the sheep were not attached.

As for the consistency of skull, we'll that something I can talk at length on. When I was a lad I had a job doing all the dirty jobs around an abettor (slaughter house). when 'alive', cow and sheep skull is hard but flexible. When hit with a cleaver it will absorb quite a lot of the energy from the impact, but will split. If you drive a sharp pole into it, it may also split, but more often than not it won't, just leave a hole.

Now if you use a ram gun, it will not always split apart but you will always get cracks running out from the point. Now this is consistent with what Alan and Tom report.

As for throwing accuracy, when you've 5,000 lads chucking them at more or less the same time, I hardly think it counts :wink:

Now let me tell you all the story about the exploding cow. You see we had this cow that had died one night. when we started work in the morning it's digestive gasses had expanded the thing to about three times it's original size. We desperately needed to diffuse the beast before it bloody exploded, but how would we do it? Just then one of the lads said 'Oh look Martivs, there's you Pilum over there"...