alt.hn

8/13/2026 at 12:47:43 PM

Shattered skeleton is first confirmed death from trebuchet

 https://www.science.org/content/article/shattered-skeleton-scottish-castle-first-confirmed-death-trebuchet

by hermitcrab

8/18/2026 at 6:11:44 AM

Trebuchets were used in the Syrian civil war (2011-2024).

I would link a video but I don't think that is a wise idea for legal reasons. There were so many parties in that war and I'm not sure which ones were declared terrorist organizations.

by CTDOCodebases

8/18/2026 at 8:29:33 AM

Please don't censor yourself. It should be possible for you to share a video of something without that meaning you support it. You probably live in a country that has free speech? Use it.

I would like to see a video of a trebuchet. Modern or not.

by johanvts

8/18/2026 at 1:14:19 PM

Every time I post something that might inflame the government, I now fully expect to have LEO show up armed at my doorstep. Yes I live in the US.

Enjoy your “free speech” but be prepared to defend it with your life.

by voakbasda

8/18/2026 at 1:19:01 PM

It must be exhausting living in total fear 24x7. Maybe go outside and get off the inet for a week or two.

by chasd00

8/18/2026 at 11:45:50 PM

just so long as you get at least one of them before they get you, you're fulfilling your life's purpose

by 27183

8/18/2026 at 5:26:41 AM

> 14th century

While this death may be the first confirmed from a trebuchet, is that really the first death by a trebuchet? Plus, I'd say catapults are almost identical to a trebuchet in workings, for the most part. I don't quite believe that this was really the first death by catapult.

by shevy-java

8/18/2026 at 7:01:54 AM

Catapults store energy using elastic deformation, like a bow; counterweight trebuchets store energy using gravity.

by pfdietz

8/18/2026 at 6:45:48 AM

Didn't the Romans have something similar?

by nephihaha

8/18/2026 at 8:21:31 AM

The Romans had onagers and ballista, both of which work via string tension. Then around 6AD it seems string traction (mangonels) where introduced from China and finally counterweight/gravity was introduced in the 12th century.

by johanvts

8/18/2026 at 10:07:34 AM

Basically more primitive versions of the same.

by nephihaha

8/18/2026 at 4:27:03 AM

But have they identified the trebuchet that killed him?

We can rule out Warwolf [1] my favorite trebuchet, which never killed anyone.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warwolf

by cobbzilla

8/18/2026 at 7:14:46 AM

> We can rule out Warwolf

Can we? That Wikipedia page is inconclusive, and thus article says:

During Edward I’s 1304 siege of the castle, English forces deployed the recently invented trebuchet, a weapon first documented in the 12th century. A cousin to the catapult, trebuchets were capable of hurling boulders weighing more than 100 kilograms hundreds of meters. One at Stirling, dubbed “War Wolf,” “was the biggest trebuchet ever built at that point,” Buckberry says. Eyewitness accounts confirm the giant siege engine was used during the 1304 battle, tearing through two stone walls “as an arrow would fly through a piece of cloth.”

Accounts of the battle don’t mention any trebuchet casualties. But Buckberry says Skeleton 150’s injuries strongly suggest at least one defender was hit from behind by a flying boulder, launched by War Wolf or one of the other siege engines arrayed outside Stirling Castle’s walls. “It’s a huge amount of energy delivered in milliseconds,” Waltenberger says. “In skeletons from past times you rarely see this.”

by Someone

8/18/2026 at 11:51:23 AM

"Recently invented" trebuchet used in 1304, "a weapon first documented in the 12th century". Something's amiss.

Trebuchets were certainly used by Richard the Lionheart and Phillip II - God's Own Sling and Bad Neighbour (Malvoisin) respectively.

I'm pretty sure Frederick Barbarossa used a custom-made Shelby Cobra outfitted with rapid-firing machine guns. He might have had a hard time turning it on though.

by fakedang

8/18/2026 at 12:46:28 PM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trebuchet#History mentions traction trebuchets, where people pulling ropes causes the rotation of the arm and counterweight trebuchets, where gravity acting on a heavy object causes that rotation, with traction trebuchets being older (4th century BC)

We have a picture of a counterweight trebuchet from around 1187, though. That’s (late) 12th century.

Wikipedia also mentions various variants on counterweight trebuchets: “Sometimes counterweight trebuchets are separated into two or three different categories based on how their counterweights are attached. These being fixed, hanging, and hinged counterweights. A fixed counterweight is an intrinsic part of the swinging arm and its trajectory is circular. Hanging counterweights hang below the arm and drop vertically. Hinged counterweights are attached to the arm by a swinging joint. Some fixed counterweights also had a hinged component. The type described by al-Tarsusi was a hanging counterweight. Writing in 1280, Giles of Rome claimed that hinged counterweight trebuchets had a greater range than fixed counterweight types”

Could be that some variant was new around 1300, or new in Europe.

by Someone

8/18/2026 at 3:04:00 PM

[dead]

by jjk166

8/13/2026 at 1:57:49 PM

Interesting find! I wonder if the massive damage could also be explained by the falling wall (documented in the article).

by JoeAltmaier

8/13/2026 at 4:31:20 PM

Indeed, I am sure there are other mechanisms that could cause similar trauma.

by hermitcrab

8/18/2026 at 8:49:00 AM

Unlikely, as a regular slow crush gives very different injuries compared to a high velocity impact.

by madaxe_again

8/18/2026 at 9:05:14 AM

It depends on how tall the damaged structure was. A large chunk of masonry falling from a tower could reach speeds comparable to a car crash.

by kijin

8/18/2026 at 5:13:03 AM

"...uncovered the graves of nine skeletons dated to the early 1300s. Five, including Skeleton 150, dated to the 1300s."

That seems like a contradiction.

by Levitating

8/18/2026 at 8:51:53 AM

I parsed it as ((mass grave containing 9 skeletons) dated to the early 1300s) && ((5 skeletons) dated to the 1300s).

As in, the grave itself was dated, and 5 of the 9 skeletons found inside were also individually dated to roughly the same century. Maybe the other 4 were not tested, or turned out to have been buried at a later date.

by kijin

8/18/2026 at 6:01:02 AM

I hate to contradict you, but it seems like a tautology.

by normie3000

8/18/2026 at 10:19:57 AM

Five did, but nine did too

by darkerside

8/18/2026 at 8:49:20 AM

“The breaks indicate a very large area of impact and devastation,” she says. “It’s likely the individual was killed by a siege engine.”

So it’s likely, which means it’s not confirmed as the headline implies.

by nexus6

8/18/2026 at 9:39:23 AM

I don't get the nitpicking here. Scientifically correct, since circumstantial. Meteor is also possible, but very unlikely.

The probability regimes in which science is dealing often only leave marginal room for alternative explanations.

by _mjk

8/18/2026 at 11:50:17 PM

People who haven't spent much time around scientists or watched them work often have a mistaken idea of just how precise the work is. Even high precision work can be found later to be wrong! That's just the system working as designed. But impugning scientists for just doing their jobs is really a bad smell, and unfortunately on this webforum it happens way too much.

by 27183

8/18/2026 at 8:46:56 AM

> indicates horrific demise

If I go, I would like to go from massive blunt trauma from behind that renders me instantly unconscious.

by petesergeant

8/18/2026 at 9:25:34 AM

Well I call you a WIMP! I want to go by literally shitting blood in an agonising pain an fever for weeks on end, like most people in these campaigns often faced their demise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dysentery

Actually, you know what, I think you might have a point there. I take back ky harsh words.

by delis-thumbs-7e

8/18/2026 at 1:24:16 PM

Interesting aside.

In the Battle of Agincourt, made famous by Henry V, the Welsh archers were supposed to be suffering from dysentery, as they destroyed the French knights.

What an embarrassment. Destroyed by guys with their pants around their ankles.

by ChrisMarshallNY

8/18/2026 at 3:41:11 PM

A kilt is a convenient garment for this scenario

by 27183

8/18/2026 at 3:48:24 AM

Hope he died quickly, instead of having to deal with the pain of multiple bones crushing

by b3ing

8/18/2026 at 5:26:10 AM

> Hope he died quickly, instead of having to deal with the pain of multiple bones crushing

from the article: “skull broken in 61 places”

Doubt you’d stay conscious long enough to notice

by Swizec

8/18/2026 at 4:49:25 AM

Instant unconsciousness. Hopefully he didn't wake up.

by kevin_thibedeau

8/18/2026 at 5:28:44 AM

How do you know that? Is it confirmed that this led to instant unconsciousness?

by shevy-java

8/18/2026 at 5:45:12 AM

The skull was found in 61 pieces, which is above the limit for quantity of pieces your skull can shatter into from blunt force while remaining alive.

by margalabargala

8/18/2026 at 6:55:16 AM

OT but... This reminds me of a classic Esquire Dubious Achievements Awards headline from the 1980s, "Man Drills 22 Holes in Head and Lives".

It went on to tell how a man had committed suicide by drilling 23 holes in his head.

by euroderf

8/18/2026 at 12:38:41 PM

> The skull was found in 61 pieces

Breaking a skull into 61 pieces by a single blunt weapon would be instantly mortal, I think, but that’s not what I read in the article. It says (emphasis added) “including a skull smashed in 61 PLACES”.

Also, https://cfp.dainst.org/25th-european-ppa-meeting/talk/GHF9V8... says: “Patterning of fractures indicates that the focus of impact was around the right shoulder and the back of the cranium, with higher fragmentation in this area”.

I’m not a expert on blunt trauma, but I think that, if the victim got trapped below the projectile, preventing rapid blood loss a bit, unconsciousness due to loss of blood pressure may have taken long enough for the victim to realize they were hit. Still unlikely in my book, though.

by Someone

8/18/2026 at 5:02:50 AM

Our modern weapons are far more destructive, but our propensity for violence and war seems to be an invariant across the millennia.

by helloworld

8/18/2026 at 5:28:02 AM

Well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Is_a_Racket

From 1935. And he was not the first one to point that out either.

I actually think that thanks to the internet, we expose many more criminal build ups towards warfare nowadays than before.

by shevy-java

8/18/2026 at 5:28:10 AM

War… war never changes.

by yurishimo

8/18/2026 at 6:09:41 AM

After all these years they finally got someone

by TheWrongGuy

8/18/2026 at 7:31:47 AM

i read death BY trebuchet, i am disappointed.

by noobmasterthrow

8/18/2026 at 2:25:54 AM

"What are you going to do, lob a stone at me from 300m away?" shouted the man on the parapet, moments before impact.

by N_Lens

8/18/2026 at 7:40:45 AM

more likely "...a furlong and more" ... no meters that time :}

by CTOSian

8/18/2026 at 6:37:33 AM

"Let me show you its features".

by avadodin

8/18/2026 at 2:38:21 AM

I hate this meme. Someone says "think about what you are doing prideful fool". And the other person still decides to use lethal force. That is diabolical, not funny.

by paxcoder

8/18/2026 at 4:34:09 AM

> Someone says "think about what you are doing prideful fool".

That strikes me as a wildly incorrect interpretation of the situation in the meme.

My reading is closer to a man on a parapet shouting "neener neener you can't touch me" moments before being touched by a rock at high velocity

by bluefirebrand

8/18/2026 at 4:36:49 AM

Yup, my favorite is the ‘what are you going to do, stab me? -stabbed man’ quote from the news interview hah.

by lazide

8/18/2026 at 5:54:34 AM

I think it was American Gangster that had the line "what are you going to do, shoot me in front of everyone?", right before he gets shot in front of everyone. That's a good one.

by King-Aaron

8/18/2026 at 5:53:30 AM

I read an account of exactly that happening to the natives in my country 200 years ago. A group paddled up the river in their canoe and the local tribesmen who were clearly more powerful taunted them. But the natives in the canoe had newly discovered guns and shot the taunters until they were "tired of man-killing" and went home. It seemed to be purely hunting humans for fun. And yes, it was horrible, that was part of a wave of wars that decimates the whole country and cost them their sovereignty.

by foxglacier

8/18/2026 at 4:19:42 AM

Diabolically funny, you mean.

by WelkinFolk

8/18/2026 at 2:15:20 AM

[flagged]

by 27183

8/18/2026 at 3:33:26 AM

[flagged]

by xprnio

8/18/2026 at 3:32:59 AM

[flagged]

by kouunji

8/18/2026 at 5:41:49 AM

first confirmed case of MLG noscope

by s20n

8/18/2026 at 8:21:26 AM

Great Scott, I think we just hit someone!

by smallnix

8/18/2026 at 2:55:59 PM

"confirmed" my ass, there are many ways for injuries like this to occure simple mistakes in forestry squish people like bugs to this day, same with masonry construction,etc. rubber ruler "science" from behind the cloud wall

by metalman