Thereupon a certain man of Tarabulus, one of the leaders of the seaman, who was acquainted with forging, and possessed some understanding and experience of warfare, set to work to construct grappling irons, with which to seize the ram, as it was butting the wall, by the head and the sides by means of ropes, which were then pulled by the townsmen until the wooden tower almost rocked with the vigour of their pulling on them. Sometimes the Franks themselves would then break the ram, fearing for the safety of the tower, sometimes it would be bent aside or rendered useless, and sometimes it was broken by means of two stones tied together and thrown down upon it from the city wall. The Franks made a number of rams, but they were broken in this fashion one after the other. Each of them was sixty cubits in length, and was slung in the wooden tower with ropes and at the head of each was piece of iron weighing more than twenty pounds.
The people of Beaucaire worked to overcome the Crusaders in the citadel, using their battering ram.: “… long, straight, sharp and shod with iron; it thrust, carved and smashed till the wall was breached and many of the dressed stones thrown down. When the besieged Crusaders saw that, they did not panic but made a rope lasso and used a device to fling it so that they caught and held the ram’s head, to the rage of all in Beaucaire.”
Were grabbers like that actually commonly used?
At least during my visits to German castles over the years I have never seen a verifies account of the use of on of them.
Commonly, no, but there are a few accounts of their use.
Curious.
Do you happen to have a link to one? My google-fu wasn’t strong enough to find one so far.
Thanks in advance.
The Siege of Tyre, and Siege of Beauclaire. I think there was another in the 10th century but I can’t find it for the life of me.
https://www.deremilitari.org/RESOURCES/SOURCES/tyre.htm
https://www.catharcastles.info/beaucaire.php
I see. But o me that still sounds like the source describes grappling hooks on ropes rather than a tower construction as depicted in the image.
Will have another go at googling later. Those things seem too-made-up-to-be-true to me.
They’re rigged to only pick up a battering-ram shelter only about 1 time in 1000. Such bullshit.