| Abstract: |
The author intends here to examine the question of the Neo Assyrian siege machines on the basis of both classical and Mesopotamian textual and iconographical sources, aiming at an attempt at reconstruction, on the technical level, of these machines. It is not the purpose of this paper to set the Assyrian siege engines in the wider Near eastern historical context of siege warfare, since this has already been done by many scholars during those past years. He therefore mainly tackles the topic of the construction of the structure of the engine, of the means of covering it, and eventually deals with the way the ram itself could have worked. The author concludes that the N-A tortoises should be compact enough to provide them sufficient mobility in order to climb up a siege ramp. They also should be technologically simple enough to be designed and assembled by a relatively unskilled labor. |
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