The Manubalista Was Rome’s Secret Weapon in Ancient Britain 🇬🇧 Secrets | Smithsonian Channel

In the hands of experienced Roman soldiers, the Manubalista was deadly: easy to move, quick to reload, and capable of launching a 7-inch, 70 mph armor-piercing projectile with terrifying accuracy.

#Secrets #SmithsonianChannel

[WestExplainsBest]

1:50
When you think they're testing its 'long range' capability, only to discover they're shooting it 15ft away from the target...

[HistoricalWeapons]

i think the biggest reason why these replicas are weak is because the string is stretching, they should try sinew instead or gut for the string or at the very least dacron

[gmanky]

“Look at that power, punched right through “

Target consisting of 3/8” plywood shot at from 20 feet…..

[simonphoenix]

The version they are using here is probably quite a bit weaker than what they would have been using. I'm guessing they would have used ropes made of sinew rather than plant fiber, and the amount of experience they had with these things likely meant they would have cranked the tension on the rope bundle up to a much greater degree.

[ElishaFollet]

Ngl its impressive just how advance and creative ancient humans were at the time, i would honestly love to see more of these weapons and similar things like this used more often in fantasy settings.

[Mitchellfab_customs]

That is in fact 6 millimeter plywood, or for the states, 1/4" plywood where most men could punch through it with their fist. I'm not sure what the point of them is showing this weak replica. It was quite the let down.

[MikeBanks]

There was also a version that threw a wicker basket or bag of plumbata which was limited by a line so that it remained behind after all of the missiles --about twenty to thirty of them, were flying skywards with devastating results for anyone underneath them. No armour was proof against them coming from above and front. The plumbata weights often found without any rust in them were probably successful hits.

[pulsarplay]

Apparently the most powerful machines were built using bundles of tendons, not plant fiber ropes as is done now in all the current reconstructions of this type of machines that I have seen. Obviously it is much simpler this way, but perhaps that is due to the lack of power that I have always observed in this type of reconstructions. Tendons are probably capable of storing torsional energy more efficiently than plant fiber.

[Memorixt]

I don’t think it was a “secret” weapon, but evidently pieces of light, medium and heavy artillery were very important, impressive and effective part of Roman warfare.

[therallyguy]

Yes. The 1/4 inch thick plywood army standing still 10 ft away would stand no chance at all.. only take 2 minutes to reload

[KJK]

inexpensive solution: Stop the lock bar from rotating further than it should. This needs to be precise thou. Otherwise it will always lift as far as you let it rotate.
You can also reduce the torque by placing the teeth closer to the rotational center of the lock bar.

[Brian-uytj]

The back board they were shooting the arrows through was a very low grade of plywood perhaps 1/4" thick (5.5mm) His recreation impressed me about as much as a 5 year old with a straw and a pocket full of peas.

[TimeSurfer]

'It has been speculated that the Roman military may have also fielded a 'repeating' ballista, also known as a polybolos. Reconstruction and trials of such a weapon carried out in a BBC documentary, What the Romans Did For Us, showed that they "were able to shoot eleven bolts a minute, which is almost four times the rate at which an ordinary ballista can be operated".'
"almost four times the rate at which an ordinary ballista can be operated..."
THIS THING HAD A RATE OF FIRE OF ALMOST THREE SHOTS PER MINUTE.
Man portable. It's in the name.
Shut up and take my money.

[patrickdaly]

Why is he shouting “fire”? You “shoot” an arrow or a bolt, you “fire” something with gun powder. Fire would have made no sense to the romans in this context.

[matthewexline]

Why are there so many names for this thing? I searched youtube for "scorpion balista" and luckily, this showed up, but I've never heard the term "manubalista" before... where does the prefix "manu" come from? I haven't heard of it before.

[warrenpeace]

I like how they're both breathing heavily as if their short walk to the target somehow depleted their energy 😂

[rageoftheredphoenix]

There was a version of this seen by the audience in the first few minutes of the popular film called gladiator. The one I saw didn’t have those two copper looking canisters on either front end of the weapon and the bolt were spear sized, larger than the one seen here.

[vripscript]

I bet if you asked the poor roman, he would just prefer a bow and arrow which fires at 230mph and takes 1/2 a second to load

[wrhabbel]

"long range" > 8 meter max, "armor piercing" > a sheet of plywood

[daviddiehl-gysq]

Wonder where the fort got the 1/4" thick plywood.