ARTILLERY. 
wood, and as light as could accord with thefe two quali¬ 
ties, in order that they might the more eaiily be tranfport- 
ed from one place to another. For the lame reafon, tIre 
different pieces of which they were computed might be 
feparated one from the other, except the hemitones, which 
were always entire, on account of the difficulty and time 
neceffary for preparing the tonus. The cords which form¬ 
ed the tonus were commonly made with the linews or ten¬ 
dons of animals ; thofe of the legs of the deer kind, and 
of the neck of a bull, were particularly recommended ; 
but they oftener preferred cords made with women’s hair, 
and conlidered them as the ffrongelt. 
The ancients had balidas and catapultas, which were of 
condruflions different from thofe we have been defcribing: 
Bitto has given a defcription of two of thefe machines, 
and fays, that it was often neceffary to diverfify their form, 
according to place, polition, and other circumdances. Phi¬ 
lo alfo makes mention of feveral alterations and correc¬ 
tions he had made in the condrutdion which was molt com¬ 
monly followed. The catapulta that Lipfius found in the 
arfenal of Bruffels, although it much refembled that above 
defcribed, yet differed from it in fome particulars, and 
had fome of the corrections which Philo mentions. The 
defcription found in Vegetius and Marceilinus, who lived 
fome years after Vitruvius, prove that, during that inter¬ 
val of time, the forms as well as the names of thofe mi¬ 
litary machines had undergone many changes. Thefe au¬ 
thors call the machine which lanced arrows and darts ba- 
UJI&-, and thofe which threw hones onager, after the ani¬ 
mal of that name, of whom it is reported, that he throws 
ftones with his feet at the hunters when purfuing him. 
Marceilinus alfo fays, that the fame machine was called a 
fcorpion, becaufe, like the infeCt of that name, it had its 
fling or dart always raifed. The power of thefe machines, 
according to what the ancients relate, muff have been very 
great. Athcmeus fpeaks of a catapulta, only one foot long, 
that threw an arrow to the didance of half a mile. It is 
laid, that others could throw javelins from one fide of the 
Danube to the other. Balidas threw great beams of wood, 
lances of twelve cubits in length, and dones that weighed 
30olbs. Polybius makes mention of dones which were 
thrown by balidas to hinder ved'els from entering into the 
port. Jofephus has likewife related feveral examples of 
the power of thefe machines ; he fays, they beat down 
the ramparts and battlements of towers, and overthrew 
whole files of foldiers even to the rear rank; and many 
other ancient authors have likewife fpoken of their pro¬ 
digious effect. When breaches were made by thefe en¬ 
gines, they were ufually defended by machines called lyo- 
nors, one of which is (hewn at Jig. 4. Thefe were driven 
with their points towards the enemy, or fixed firmly in 
the breach with pods and chains, fothattheadailantscould 
not dorm the works without frefii danger and difficulty. 
Other engines of ancient artillery, tiled by our ancedors, 
were the mangonel, the trebuchet, the petrary, the robi- 
net, the mate-griffon, the bricolle, the bugle or bible, the 
efpringal, the mata-funda, the ribaudequin, engine-a- 
verge, and the war-wolf; many of which continued in life 
fome time after the introduction of cannon. The term 
mangona, it is faid, was generical, (landing for all kinds of 
warlike machines ; and was a Greek word of that import, 
in ufe in the time of the lower empire. The trebuchet 
was an engine for throwing dones, for which purpofe a 
ding was fometimes fixed to it; it acted by means of a 
great weight fadened to the fliort arm of a lever, which 
being let fall, raifed the end of the long arm with great 
velocity, whereby the dones were difeharged. The pe¬ 
trary was alfo a done-throwing machine, as its name im¬ 
ports. The robinet and mate-griffon threw both darts 
and ffiowers of dones. The bricolle, according to Froif- 
fart, diot darts called carreaux, from their folid fquare 
pyramidical heads of iron; this adted by the fame moving 
power as the trebuchet. Beugles or bibles were alfo en¬ 
gines for throwing large dones, as we learn from an ancient 
poem called the Romance of Claris. The efpringal was 
23? 
calculated for throwing large darts, called muchettae; 
fometimes, indead of feathers, they were winged with 
brai's; thefe darts were alfo called viretons, from their 
whirling about in the air. The matafunda was a done- 
throwing machine, probably by means of ailing; fome 
derive its name from the words funcla and matlare, fome¬ 
times written mature, i.e. a murdering ding. The ribau¬ 
dequin was a large kind of crofs-bow. The war-wolf is 
very differently defcribed by different writers. Procopius's 
account feeming to be the mod accurate, we fhall give it 
in his own words : “ At the gates they fet up wolves, made 
thus: they fet two beams from the ground reaching to the 
battlements, and laying chequer-wife pieces of timber 
wrought, fome upright, and fome crofs ; they joint them 
fo that the mot tilling holes meete one another ; and before 
each joint dicks out a pointed piece of wood like a thick 
fpiirr, and fadening the crofs timbers to another beam, 
which, from the top, reaches half way down; they lay 
the beams flat long upon the gates, and, an enemy ap¬ 
proaching, men above lay hold of the higher ends of the 
beams, and timid them down, which, falling fuddenly 
among the affailants with thofe wooden points dicking out, 
kill all they light on.” Procopius's Hiflory of the Gothic Wars r 
b. i. p. 27. Probably there was a chain or cord to draw it 
back after it had taken effeif. Of the engine-a-verge 
there is no particular defcription; but, from a paffage in 
the Hidory of Charles VII. of France, quoted by father 
Daniel, we learn, that it was a projectile machine, that it 
was ul’ed with cannon, and that it remained in ufe after the 
other machines were laid a fide : “ Lefquels eugins-a-verge 
& bombardes, dit l’hidorien, jettoient & tiroient nuit & 
jour fans cede contre ce chateau.” Of the vad force of 
thefe machines furprifing dories are related, though, from 
the conftnuftion of our ancient cadles, it does not feem as 
if their range w'as very great, fince many of our mod im¬ 
portant fortredes are commanded by hills within four or 
five hundred yards of them; as for inftance, the cadle of 
Dover, once deemed the key of this kingdom, and alfo 
thofe of Corfe and Guildford. Mezeray fays, the great - 
ed range of a mangonel was five dadia, or 1042 yards, but 
then this'was at an elevation; thefe machines not only 
threw darts and large (tones, but even the bodies of men 
and horfes, indances of both being mentioned by Froiffart; 
and many furprifing efforts of a limilar kind occur in the 
wars of China, for which fee China. 
Of the machines moved by human drength, the chief 
was the battering-ram, which was a huge beam or beams 
joined together, having its extremity fhod with iron, lome- 
times cad in the diape of the head of a ram ; it was pulhcd 
forwards by the united drength of a number of men, in 
the method diewn in the annexed Plate ; when its iron 
head linking or butting againd the wall, in the manner of 
the animal whole name it bore, it difplaced the dones, 
and made a breach. The ram, though fometimes flip- 
ported on the fhoulders of men, was more frequently fuf- 
pended to a triangle, or beam, fo that the whole force of 
the men was directed to pudiing it forwards; the ram wars 
frequently ufed in the middle of the 14th century. Dr. 
Delaguliers, however, has demondrated, that the momen¬ 
tum of a battering-ram, twenty-eight inches in diameter, 
180 feet long, with a head of cad-iron of one ton and a 
half, the whole ram with its iron hoops weighing 41,11 2lb. 
and moved by the united drength of a thoufand men, will 
be only equal to a ball of 361b. lhot point blank from a 
cannon. Sir Chridopher Wren made great ufe of the bat¬ 
tering-ram to demolifh and throw down the walls of the 
old church of St. Paul, previous to rebuilding it. He 
found no machine equal to it for that purpofe, particularly 
in disjoining the dones. 
The machines ufed forcovering the approaches of troops 
employed in fieges, were moveable towers of feveral do¬ 
ries, called belfreys, cats, and lows, fimilarto the tortoile, 
vinea, and pluteus, of the ancients: thefe were fixed on 
wheels, and likewife puflied forward or drawn by human 
drength, latterly fome tunes affided by the capftern, 01 
other 
