Medieval siege weapons

The medieval period was probably the most varied in military history when it came to the development of non-gunpowder military machines. One reason for this was the bringing together of several pre-existing military-technological traditions from the ancient Graeco-Roman World, Persia, India and China. Three civilizations were primarily responsible for the ease with which such technologies were brought together and combined: the Late-Roman or Byzantine Empire; the Islamic World; and the Mongol "World Empire". This work looks at the stone throwing machines that used assorted sources of power from torsion "energy storage" systems, to manpowered sling devices, counterbalance sling devices and rockets.