320 GREEK SCIENCE. 



Siege of Archimedes, those connected with the siege of Syracuse, which ended 

 Sy ^2i2. B. c. 212. Hiero the friend of Archimedes had closed his reign a few 

 years sooner. Gelo his son, and apparently the pupil of the mathe- 

 matician, had died before his father. Hieronymus, the son of Gelo, 

 succeeded to the throne, but not to the popularity of his grandfather ; 

 he shortly fell the victim of a conspiracy, and Syracuse became a prey 

 to contending factions, who soon engaged her in a quarrel with the 

 Eomans. Marcellus by sea, and Appius by land, laid siege to the 

 city, and it would probably have been soon taken had it not been for 

 the extraordinary resources of mechanical skill which Archimedes 

 produced in its defence. We have an account of them in Polybius, 

 one of the most intelligent and scrupulous of historians, and who was 

 bora a few years only after the time. He says, that when the Roman 

 fleet appeared sailing towards the city, it was assailed at a distance 

 from the walls by powerful machines, which threw darts and stones : 

 that when it got too near for the range of these, others were used so 

 actively that Marcellus was obliged to approach the city, under pro- 

 tection of the night : and that when they were near it, such an artillery 

 of arrows and other missiles was played upon them, that they were 

 unable to make the assault and suffered great loss. To protect the 

 besiegers from such attacks in their approaches, they built upon vessels, 

 certain machines in use among the ancients, and called sambucse. 

 When these came near, there suddenly started above the walls large 

 cranes carrying stones of ten talents and heavy masses of lead : these 

 were brought over the sambucas and then let fall, so as to break 

 through the whole structure and nearly to sink the ships on which it 

 was carried. Large levers were also made, to project over the walls, 

 from which iron claws were suspended ; by these the vessels were 

 seized by the prows and hoisted half way out of the sea, and then let 

 fall, with such violence, as to be sometimes dashed under water : so 

 that, as Marcellus observed, Archimedes used his ships like buckets. 

 By these contrivances the Roman soldiers suffered so much, that at 

 last, the appearance of a rope or a pole above the walls, threw them 

 into a panic, for fear of some new instrument of annoyance. 



There does not seem to be any reason to doubt these statements, 

 which are confirmed by the universal consent of historians. In fact, 

 while modern artillery was unknown, much greater attention was paid 

 to improving those instruments which were used ; and the effects pro- 

 duced exceeded, in many cases, anything that we should think possible, 

 without the use of gunpowder. The powers which were employed, 

 were sometimes the elasticity of large beams of wood, of which a 

 gigantic bow was made, and worked by machinery ; and sometimes 

 the forces of cords of different substances, which being violently 

 twisted, were allowed to untwist, and thus to give motion to a lever 

 inserted in them. We have descriptions of such machines, by Hero 

 of Alexandria, who lived not long after Archimedes. With respect to 

 the latter kind, he says that the best materials for the cords, are the 



