Yassou! (That’s Greek for Hi.) I’m the Greek Gumshoe (Gumshoe is not Greek, but it means detective.) I like to investigate Greek weaponry. The ancient Greek ballista is a cool weapon. It is very similar to a giant crossbow and is actually where we get the word ballistic, which means going crazy with fear or anger. It also is the study of missiles or bullets or other stuff shot through the air.
The ballista was first referenced in the Bible. It is able to shoot both arrows and stones . It uses torsion spring technology. (Kind of funny that their technology was animal guts twisted together, huh?) It’s the biggest invention in war before gunpowder. It was used by the Romans and Greeks, and many countries during the Middle Ages. It’s design was used to make a smaller version called the Scorpio.
Pretty cool, huh?
I made my own Greek Ballista out of popsicle sticks:
This is where you can get the directions to make your own popsicle ballista:
//www.stormthecastle.com/catapult/popsicle-stick-ballista/popsicle-stick-ballista.htm
Tune in next time so that we can investigate another weapon.
