Large Lithoboloi
Missile Siege Weapon(0.6.7)Side / Back
Short description
An enormous form of ballista that can hurl stone balls hundreds of yards. Slow and clumsy to maneuvre.
Description
In the ancient world, artillery was a weapon of the Greek and later on, the Roman world. From the invention of the Ballista (circa 400 BC), this technology remained the standard form of artillery until gunpowder reached Europe hundreds of years later. The ballista itself was derived from the gastraphetes, an ancient crossbow that was enlarged and mounted on a turret to form an artillery weapon. This in turn was evolved and perfected by the Romans. Over the centuries they produced many variants, from the smaller scorpiones used by the Legions, to the Lithobolos itself.
The credit of this machine lies with the crafty Greek, Archimedes. He once proved his scientific theories to Hiero, ruler of Syracuse by using pullies to single-handedly tow a fully laden warship through the water! After that, Hiero commissioned the great thinker to build all sorts of contraptions to defend Syracuse against siege from the sea; amongst other things, the Lithobolos. Ironically, on the few future occasions when it was used, it was by their one-time opponents, when the Romans besieged large fortified cities.
These were enormous contraptions, designed to throw stone balls from 10 to 180lb in weight! As with the weight of their ammunition, these weapons varied greatly in size, but some of the larger ones would have been the height of several men. Angled at 45 degrees to get maximum distance from the machine, they fired their projectiles up to hundreds of yards.
In history, artillery on the battlefield has always been a resource of limited usefulness. Even though the Legions all carried Scorpiones, they were rarely used to inflict any significant casualties on the enemy in field battles; artillery's most important use was in siege warfare. But as a weapon to break up formations and terrify enemies, it is almost unrivalled!