history question?

Question

what are 4 things you might do to attack a well-defended castle? please describe your actions the weapons you would use and the pasrts of the castle you would aim for.

Answer 1

To attack a castle I would have sappers who are people who dig under the walls of the castle and then cave-in their tunnels in order to make the walls collapse. I would use a battering ram in order to penetrate the gate which is probably the weakest point of the castle. I would use scaling tools like ladders and grappling hooks to attempt to scale the walls. Finally I would use ballistas, trebuchets, and other projectile devices in order to either destroy the wall, or kill the defenders. I would aim for the weakest points on the castle, those being: the gate, and the straight walls (towers were quite strong).

It is a culvert. They did not have those kinds of explosives in Medieval times.

Answer 2

1. You could try an advance with a large number of troops with siege ladders, trying to scale the walls at multiple points. If the walls weren't well enough defended (or there weren't a lot of defenders) this could work, but likely you'd take horrific losses. A better method on this same approach would be to construct siege towers of a height equal to that of the walls, with thick fire-resistant armor which would then be rolled into position and then your forces would try to take the walls in that way. Best of all, you should use siege engines like catapults, ballistae, and trebuchets to pound the defenders and soften them up before the actual attack.

2. You could use engineers or sappers to try to dig under the walls, weakening the foundations and hopefully forcing a breach or an entrance.

3. If there was sewer/water access to the castle and you knew where it was you could send a small party to infiltrate and emerge within the castle, then overwhelm the defenders of the gates/drawbridge and have that lowered/opened so that your main force could get in unimpeded.

4. (And I think this was generally the most common) you could do nothing. Set up a perimeter outside the castle to hold siege and make certain no enemy supplies or forces got in or out and wait it out. Maybe an offer of conditional surrender could be extended in hopes that the defenders would finally give up after starving. Possible the best offer would be to the soldiers themselves (ie 'if you deliver us the heads of your leaders, the rest of you can go home')

Anyway, there's a stab at it. Your question though is awfully general. You'd have to know exactly what the dimensions of the castle were, how many defenders there were, what their provisions were, etc.

Answer 3

first you would have to completely surround the castle in order to cut off any supplies or reenforcements, then it all depends on resources available, lumber, water, how far away are your supply trains and are you in a fortified position ?
tribochets and attack towers wtih battering rams would be the only seige weapons you could use, catapults dont have much range. First I was the surronding forces commander, i would ask that htey surrender, if yes then great, if no then i would tell them that I will allow them to let the women and children come out, but i would keep control of them and make them work in my surgical area, then i would bombard the walls and internal structures with flaming balls of rock and pitch non stop focusing on several sections of the walls equally, if all went well i would breach the wall in two places to offer my troops an exit if they were to be overrun during the attack and have the option of what part of the wall was defened better, i would focus on the main gate with my battering rams as thats what they are for, and the seige towers i would use on the corners of the walls where they hav to bunch up to defend, plus id tribochet the heck out of them as i move my seige towers in to position, then after taking all prisoners, and reuniting them with family, i would offer them a chance to serve in my army and on my lands, if not ,then id have to sell them as slaves to another tribe or country

Answer 4

In the Lord of the Rings the Uruk Hai bomb the little tunnel where water comes in... I forget what it's called.