nature of catapult stone

[richsc]

I was just speaking with a hopefully new member to Legio XX, Sean Kuhl (acquainted with you Sander.he says hello). He was relating experiences with European reenactors (are there really hundreds of naked Belgian/Gaulish warrior reenactors????) and he was relating how large artillery stones were known to explode or fragment on impact. I happened to remember all the stone shot at Pompeii, from Sulla's seige around 90BC, if I remember right, which is all solid and unbroken. Some had left impressions in the town walls.<br>
Stone of course can be many different types: sandstone and shale would be more likely I would think to break up and fragment than granite. Explode?<br>
Any references out there to the types of projectiles used in roman artillery? <p></p><i></i>

[mcbishop]

The catapult stones from Corbridge that I have looked at were all made of the local sandstone and, although a few had split, most were intact and, I suspect, never used (they were used in the foundations of Site XI). Carving these things appears to have been the Roman army equivalent of painting coal.<br>
<br>
The article by Holley (Holley, A.E. 1994: 'The ballista balls from Masada', in Masada IV. The Yigael Yadin Excavations 1963-1965 Final Reports, Jerusalem) is more concerned with calibres than the types of stone used - it is a fascinating read (although he does tend to 'fire' stones rather than 'shoot' them), but not much help to you. I have also seen (from another period) the stones shot by the Sultan Baibars (not personally, you understand) into the crusader-period castle at Sayhun in Syria, all intact. Of course, you could argue that any that did explode would be unlikely to be collected except in the most recent excavations, but I would doubt any commander would allow his troops to spend hours whittling away at these things if the stone used was softer than the walls at which they were shooting!<br>
<br>
Mike Bishop <p></p><i></i>