Trebuchet (Edited from Wikipedia)

SUMMARY

A trebuchet is a type of most frequently used in the Middle Ages. It is sometimes called a counterweight trebuchet or counterpoise trebuchet, to distinguish it from an earlier called the traction trebuchet, where men pulling ropes provided the power.

The counterweight trebuchet appeared in both Christian and Muslim lands around the Mediterranean in the . It could fling projectiles weighing up to 350 pounds (160 kg) at or into enemy fortifications. Its use continued into the , well after the introduction of .

HISTORY

The trebuchet evolved from the .

A sling is a projectile weapon typically used to throw a blunt projectile such as a stone, clay, or lead "sling-bullet". It is also known as the shepherd's sling.

A sling has a small cradle or pouch in the middle of two lengths of cord. The sling stone is placed in the pouch. The middle finger or thumb is placed through a loop on the end of one cord, and a tab at the end of the other cord is placed between the thumb and forefinger. The sling is swung in an arc, and the tab released at a precise moment. This frees the projectile to fly to the target. The sling essentially works by extending the length of a human arm, thus allowing stones to be thrown much farther than they could be by hand.

The sling is inexpensive and easy to build. It has historically been used for hunting game and in combat. Film exists of Spanish Civil War combatants using slings to throw grenades over buildings into enemy positions on the opposite street. Today the sling is of interest as a wilderness survival tool and an improvised weapon.

The sling is mentioned in the Bible, which provides what is believed to be the oldest textual reference to a sling in the Book of Judges, 20:16.

1 The Bible provides a famous slinger account, the battle between David and Goliath from the First Book of Samuel 17:34-36, describing events that occurred sometime around the 11 th century BC. The sling, easily produced, was the weapon of choice for shepherds fending off animals. Due to this, the sling was a commonly used weapon by the Israelite militia. Goliath was a tall, well equipped and experienced warrior. In this account, the shepherd David convinces Saul to let him fight Goliath on behalf of the Israelites. Unarmoured and equipped only with a sling, 5 smooth rocks, and his staff; David defeats the champion Goliath with a well-aimed shot to the head.

Use of the sling is also mentioned in Second Kings 3:25, First Chronicles 12:2, and Second Chronicles 26:14 to further illustrate Israelite use.

The traction trebuchet originated in . A variation of the sling, called staff sling, contained a short piece of wood to extend the arm and provide greater leverage. This evolved into the traction trebuchet in which a number of people pulled on ropes attached to the short arm of a lever that has a sling on the long arm. This type of trebuchet was smaller and had a shorter range, but was a more portable machine and had a shorter cycle time than larger, counterweight-powered types. The smallest traction trebuchets could be powered by the weight and pulling strength of one person using a single rope, but most were designed and sized for between 15 and 45 men, generally two per rope. These teams would sometimes be local citizens helping in the siege or in the defense of their town. Traction trebuchets had a range of 100 to 200 feet (30 to 61 m) when casting weights up to 250 pounds (110 kg).

The first traction trebuchets were invented by the Chinese sometime before the 4th century BC. At the Battle of Caishi in 1161, trebuchets operated by soldiers fired bombs of lime and sulphur against the ships of the Jin dynasty navy during the Jin–Song wars. Recent work showed that the traction trebuchet was transferred to the eastern Mediterranean by the late 6th century during the Northern Zhou or Sui dynasty.

The traction trebuchet next appeared in Byzantium. A book by Emperor Maurice, composed in the late 6th century, calls for "ballistae revolving in both directions," probably traction trebuchets. The Miracles of Saint Demetrius, composed between 610 and 620 AD by John I, archbishop of Thessalonike, clearly describe traction trebuchets in the Avaro-Slav : "Hanging from the back sides of these pieces of timber were slings and from the front strong ropes, by which, pulling down and releasing the sling, they propel the stones up high and with a loud noise."

2 They were also used with great effect by the Islamic armies during the Muslim conquests. A surviving Arab technical treatise on these machines was written in 1462. It provides detailed construction and operating information.

In the 12th century, the Byzantine historian Niketas Choniates described a trebuchet used by , future Byzantine emperor, at the siege of Zevgminon in 1165. It was equipped with a windlass, an apparatus which was required neither for traction nor hybrid trebuchets to launch missiles. Chevedden dates the invention of the new artillery type back to the Siege of Nicaea in 1097 when the Byzantine emperor Komnenos, an ally of the besieging crusaders, was reported to have invented new pieces of heavy artillery which deviated from the conventional design and made a deep impression on everyone.

The dramatic increase in military performance is for the first time reflected in historical records on the occasion of the second in 1124, when the crusaders reportedly made use of "great trebuchets". By the 1120–30s, the counterweight trebuchet had diffused not only to the , but probably also westwards to the Normans of Sicily and eastwards to the Great Seljuqs. The military use of the new gravity-powered artillery culminated in the 12th century during the (1189– 91) which saw the kings Richard I of and Philip II of wrestle for control of the city with 's .

During the , Philip II of France named two of the trebuchets he used in the Siege of Acre in 1191 "God's Stone-Thrower" and "Bad Neighbor." During a siege of Stirling in 1304, Edward Longshanks ordered his engineers to make a giant trebuchet for the English army, named "Warwolf". Range and size of the varied.

In 1421 the future Charles VII of France commissioned a trebuchet that could shoot a stone of 800 kg, while in 1188 at Ashyun, rocks up to 1,500 kg were used. Average mass of the projectiles was probably around 50–100 kg, with a range of c. 300 meters. The cycle rate could be noteworthy: at the siege of Lisbon (1147), two were capable of launching a stone every 15 seconds. Also human corpses could be used on special occasion: in 1422 Prince Korybut, for example, in the siege of Karlštejn Castle shot men and manure within the enemy walls, apparently managing to spread infection among the defenders. The largest trebuchets needed exceptional quantities of timber: at the Siege of Damietta, in 1249, Louis IX of France was able to build a stockade for the whole Crusade camp with the wood from 24 captured Egyptian trebuchets.

Counterweight trebuchets do not appear with certainty in Chinese historical records until about 1268, when the laid siege to Fancheng and Xiangyang. At the Siege

3 of Fancheng and Xiangyang, the Mongol army, unable to capture the cities despite besieging the Song defenders for years, brought in two Persian engineers who built hinged counterweight trebuchets.

These engines were called by the Chinese historians the Huihui , or Xiangyang Catapult because they were first encountered in that battle. After Aju asked Kublai, the Emperor of the , to help him with the powerful siege machines of the Ilkhanate, Ismail and Al-aud-Din from arrived in South China to construct a new type of trebuchet. These Persian engineers built and trebuchets for the siege.

Chinese and Muslim engineers operated Artillery and siege engines for the Mongol armies. The design was taken from those used by Hulegu to batter down the walls of Baghdad. The Chinese were the inventors of the traction trebuchet, but now they faced Muslim-designed counterweight trebuchets in the Mongol army. The Chinese responded by building their own counterweight trebuchets.

With the introduction of gunpowder, the trebuchet lost its place as the of choice to the . Trebuchets were used both at the siege of Burgos (1475–1476) and siege of (1480). One of the last recorded military uses was by Hernán Cortés, at the 1521 siege of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán. Accounts of the attack note that its use was motivated by the limited supply of gunpowder. The attempt was reportedly unsuccessful: the first projectile landed on the trebuchet itself, destroying it. In 1779, British forces defending Gibraltar, finding that their were unable to fire far enough for some purposes, constructed a trebuchet. It is unknown how successful this was: the Spanish attackers were eventually defeated, but this was largely due to a sortie.

HOW IT WORKS

The three distinguishing characteristics of a trebuchet are:

1. The trebuchet is a compound machine—a combination of simple machines. The trebuchet makes use of the mechanical advantage of a lever. Most trebuchets are powered exclusively by the of gravity. Potential energy is stored by means of an extremely heavy weight box attached (by a hinged connection) to the counterweight portion of the throwing arm. Some earlier trebuchets stored potential energy as traction force (traction trebuchets).

2. When the trebuchet is fired, the weight box is permitted to fall and the force of gravity causes rotational acceleration of the attached throwing arm around the

4 axle (the fulcrum of the lever). The throwing arm is usually four to six times the length of the counterweight portion. These factors multiply the acceleration transmitted to the throwing portion of the arm and its attached sling.

3. The sling is affixed to the end of the throwing portion of the throwing arm (opposite the counter weight portion). The sling contains the projectile and transmits the forces generated at the end of the throwing arm to the projectile. The sling also changes the trajectory, so that, at the time of release from the sling, the projectile is traveling in the desired speed and angle to give it the range to reach the target.

Design Evolution

The earliest form of trebuchet, often called the traction trebuchet, utilized the power of the human body to pull down on the lever arm to launch the desired projectile. However, this was eventually deemed an inefficient method of warfare, which motivated ancient engineers to update the design. The next step in the development of this siege engine was the invention of the fixed counterweight trebuchet.

Ancient armies directly utilized gravity to launch projectiles at their enemies by placing a large weight on the short end of the trebuchet's lever arm and then letting it fall. This was a more efficient and powerful machine than the traction trebuchet because it reduced the number of men needed to operate it and could be fired repeatedly without wearing out.

As societies advanced, so did the trebuchet's design. While the fixed counterweight trebuchet was devastatingly effective, it was subject to a great deal of fatigue stress during operation. This led to a shortened operational life cycle. The counterweight was eventually placed upon a hinge. This allowed the counterweight to swing as it reached the bottom of its fall, thus reducing the stresses placed upon the frame and throwing arm. Not only did this improvement increase the usable life of the machine, but by propping the counterweight up on the hinge, the total distance traveled increased. By increasing the distance the counterweight fell, ancient engineers also increased the rotational speed of the lever arm. This, in turn, increased the launch speed and impact force of the projectile.

THE CRUSADES

The Crusades were predominantly a series of religious wars undertaken by the between the 11th and 15th centuries; historians cannot agree on any single

5 definition of a crusade, or which specific military campaigns should be included. Crusades were fought for many reasons: to capture , recapture Christian territory or defend Christians in non-Christian lands, resolve conflict among rival Roman groups, gain political or territorial advantage, or to combat paganism and heresy.

The arose after a call to arms in a 1095 sermon by Pope Urban II. Urban urged military support for the and its Emperor, Alexios I, who needed reinforcements for his conflict with westward migrating Turks in . Although one of Urban's stated aims was to guarantee pilgrims access to the holy sites in the that were under Muslim control, scholars disagree whether this was the primary motivation for Urban or for the majority of those who heeded his call. Urban's wider strategy may have been to unite the Eastern and Western branches of Christendom, which had been divided since their split in the East–West Schism of 1054, and establish himself as head of the unified Church. Similarly, some of the hundreds of thousands of people who became crusaders by taking a public vow and receiving plenary indulgences from the church were peasants hoping for Apotheosis at Jerusalem, or forgiveness from God for all their sins. Others, historians argue, participated to satisfy feudal obligations, gain glory and honor, or find opportunities for economic and political gain. Regardless of the motivation, the response to Urban's preaching by people of many different classes across Western Europe established the precedent for later crusades.

Actions carried out at least nominally under Papal authority during the crusades have polarized historians. Contrary to their stated aims and promises, crusaders often pillaged as they travelled, and their leaders retained much of the captured territory rather than returning it to the Byzantines. The People's Crusade included the Rhineland massacres: the murder of thousands of Jews. was sacked during the , rendering the reunification of Christendom impossible. These and other controversial actions were incongruous with the stated aims and implied moral authority of the papacy and the crusades, in one case to the extent that the Pope excommunicated crusaders.

[Note: This summary paints the Byzantine people as victims, and the Latin Christians as villains. The reality isn’t so clear-cut. You’ll see why as you read the section below about the “Massacre of the .”]

The crusades had a profound impact on Western civilization: they reopened the Mediterranean to commerce and travel (enabling and Venice to flourish); consolidated the collective identity of the Latin Church under papal leadership; and were a wellspring for accounts of heroism, chivalry and piety. These tales consequently

6 galvanized medieval romance, philosophy and literature. The crusades also reinforced the connection between Western Christendom, feudalism, and militarism.

THE MASSACRE OF THE LATINS

The Massacre of the Latins was a large-scale massacre of the Roman Catholic (called "Latin") inhabitants of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, by the Eastern Orthodox population of the city in April 1182.

The Roman Catholics of Constantinople at that time dominated the city's maritime trade and financial sector. Although precise numbers are unavailable, the bulk of the Latin community, estimated at 60,000 at the time by Eustathius of Thessalonica, was wiped out or forced to flee. The Genoese and Pisan communities especially were decimated, and some 4,000 survivors were sold as slaves to the (Turkish) .

The massacre further worsened relations and increased enmity between the Western and Eastern Christian churches, and a sequence of hostilities between the two followed.

Background

Since the late 11th century, Western merchants, primarily from the Italian city-states of Venice, Genoa and , had started appearing in the East. The first had been the Venetians, who had secured large-scale trading concessions from Byzantine emperor . Subsequent extensions of these privileges and Byzantium's own naval impotence at the time resulted in a virtual maritime monopoly and stranglehold over the Empire by the Venetians.

Alexios' grandson, , wishing to reduce their influence, began to reduce the privileges of Venice while concluding agreements with her rivals: Pisa, Genoa and Amalfi. Gradually, all four Italian cities were also allowed to establish their own quarters in the northern part of Constantinople itself, towards the .

The predominance of the Italian merchants caused economic and social upheaval in Byzantium: it accelerated the decline of the independent native merchants in favor of big exporters, who became tied to the landed aristocracy, who in turn increasingly amassed large estates. Together with the perceived arrogance of the Italians, it fueled popular resentment amongst the middle and lower classes both in the countryside and in the cities.

7 The religious differences between the two sides, who viewed each other as schismatics, further exacerbated the problem. The Italians proved uncontrollable by imperial authority: in 1162, for instance, the Pisans together with a few Venetians raided the Genoese quarter in Constantinople, causing much damage. Emperor Manuel subsequently expelled most of the Genoese and Pisans from the city, thus giving the Venetians a free hand for several years.

In early 1171, however, when the Venetians attacked and largely destroyed the Genoese quarter in Constantinople, the Emperor retaliated by ordering the mass arrest of all Venetians throughout the Empire and the confiscation of their property. A subsequent Venetian expedition in the Aegean failed: a direct assault was impossible due to the strength of the Byzantine forces, and the Venetians agreed to negotiations, which the Emperor stalled intentionally. As talks dragged on through the winter, the Venetian fleet waited at , until an outbreak of the plague forced them to withdraw.

The Venetians and the Empire remained at war, with the Venetians prudently avoiding direct confrontation but sponsoring Serb uprisings, besieging , Byzantium's last stronghold in Italy, and signing a treaty with the Norman .

Relations between the Venetians and Byzantine only slightly improved: there is evidence of a treaty in 1179, although a full restoration of relations would only be reached in the mid-. Meanwhile, the Genoese and Pisans profited from the dispute with Venice, and by 1180, it is estimated that up to 60,000 Latins lived in Constantinople.

The Massacre

Following the death of Manuel I in 1180, his widow, the Latin princess Maria of Antioch, acted as regent to her infant son Alexios II Komnenos. Her regency was notorious for the favoritism shown to Latin merchants and the big aristocratic land- owners, and was overthrown in April 1182 by Andronikos I Komnenos, who entered the city in a wave of popular support. Almost immediately, the celebrations spilled over into violence towards the hated Latins, and after entering the city's Latin quarter a mob began attacking the inhabitants.

Many had anticipated the events and escaped by sea. The ensuing massacre was indiscriminate: neither women nor children were spared, and Latin patients lying in hospital beds were murdered. Houses, churches, and charities were looted. Latin clergymen received special attention, and Cardinal John, the papal legate, was beheaded and his head was dragged through the streets at the tail of a dog.

8 Although Andronikos himself had no particular anti-Latin attitude, he allowed the massacre to proceed unchecked. A few years later, Andronikos I himself was deposed and handed over to the mob of Constantinople citizenry, and was tortured and summarily executed in the Hippodrome by Latin soldiers.

Impact

The massacre further worsened the image of the Byzantines in the West, and although regular trade agreements were soon resumed between Byzantium and Latin states, the underlying hostility would remain, leading to a spiraling chain of hostilities: a Norman expedition under William II of Sicily in 1185 sacked Thessalonica, the Empire's second largest city, and the German emperors Frederick Barbarossa and Henry VI both threatened to attack Constantinople.

The worsening relationship culminated with the brutal sack of the city of Constantinople by the Fourth Crusade in 1204, which led to the permanent alienation of Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics. The massacre itself however remains relatively obscure, and Catholic historian Warren Carroll notes that "Historians who wax eloquent and indignant—with considerable reason—about the ... rarely if ever mention the massacre of the Westerners in ... 1182."

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