A trebuchet is a siege engine that was employed in the Middle Ages either to smash masonry walls or to throw projectiles over them.

The counterweight trebuchet appeared the twelfth century. It could fling up to three-hundred and fifty pound (140 kg) projectiles at high speeds into enemy fortifications. On occasion, disease-infected corpses were flung into cities in an attempt to infect or terrorize the people under siege—a medieval form of biological warfare. Trebuchets were far more accurate than other medieval catapults.

August 17th, 2009 Subscribe to the RSS feed!