Ranged Weaponry (Pre-1700)

A Roman Ballista

A catapult is any one of a number of non-handheld mechanical devices used to throw a projectile a great distance without the aid of an explosive substance—particularly various types of ancient and medieval siege engines. The picture above is of a Roman Ballista and was used to great success by the Romans, however, the design for the Balliata was not invented by the Romans. It was in fact invented by the Greeks and later revised by the Romans. The design uses no chemical reaction to launch its projectile instead it uses a system of pulleys to create torque and then releases that torque to propel the projectile. The projectile was normally a large arrow and would sometimes contain a jar of flaming oil to increase its killing capabilities. The Ballista was a highly accurate weapon (there are many accounts of single soldiers being picked off by Ballista operators), but some design aspects meant it could compromise its accuracy for range. The manpower required is very little in fact it could be run by one person, however, the common manpower used was 2-3 so that it could be reloaded faster. The Ballista was pretty cheap to build and was made out of common material such as wood, rope, and some metal gears were added in later versions to increase torque. The Ballista was used as a defensive weapon because of its low mobility. It's economic impact was a positive one because it now required less solders to defend a city,thus less soldiers to manage. The Ballista was used through time and could be considered the first catapult. Its design lead to many breakthroughs in projectile firing warfare.

The design of the Ballista made combat less personal but it was still to the point where a solder firing the Ballista could see the damage being done. This would change with time.