He advocated humanism and the peaceful use of science, but earned his living as a military engineer. In his arsenal there are sketches of a sickle chariot, a tank and even a machine gun.
Corkscrew torpedo
Ironically, one of Leonardo's main military developments today serves the most peaceful purposes in the kitchen, as a corkscrew. A medieval torpedo, according to the idea of a genius, was screwed into the skin of the ship and tore it apart. The operation was purely underwater. Perhaps, in addition to it, Leonardo developed devices that allow a person to remain unnoticed under water for a long time - a prototype of an aqualung and a submarine.
Submarine
A drawing by Leonardo dates back to 1502, in which researchers see a project of a submarine. The reason that the first submarines appeared only three centuries later, in the 18th century, lies in the peacefulness of the genius. He accompanied his drawing with the following comment: “With the help of devices, people will be able to stay under water for a certain time … I do not publish or disclose my method due to the evil nature of people who would engage in treacherous murders at the bottom of the seas, destroying ships and sinking them together with the team."
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Scythe chariot
Braids hung on all sides of Leonardo's murderous chariot. She was supposed to act on the principle of a lawn mower - to break through the ranks of cavalry and infantry, mowing the legs of opponents. Judging by the drawings accompanying the sketch, Leonardo's chariot could have become the most deadly weapon of the Renaissance.
Machine gun
Da Vinci researchers say that his main engineering credo was to reduce the role of the human factor during combat. The more operations the mechanism performs, the less chance of error. It was Leonardo who came up with the idea to design a guidance system, which, according to researcher Cass Etienne, increased the hitting accuracy 10 times. Until then, during the firing of fifteen shots, only one reached the target. In order to get rid of the principle of “shooting guns at sparrows” forever, Leonardo created a machine that resembles a modern machine gun in functionality. The technology of that time had not yet matured to fast firing from one barrel, therefore, speed was replaced by quantity. Da Vinci proposed to collect 11 muskets on three boards and connect them together. The idea was that while some were shooting, others were reloading.
Da Vinci tank
In another way, it is called a "battle wagon". It looked like a round, closed machine on all sides, which was set in motion by the power of seven people. Horses were originally planned, but the inventor quickly abandoned the idea as the animals would panic in a confined space. "Tank" Leonardo not only had to crush the enemy, but also shoot him. For this, muskets were located around the entire circumference of the vehicle. Fortunately, it, like most of Leonardo's inventions, remained only on paper.
Steam cannon
The cannon barrel was made of a copper pipe, one of the ends of which was placed in a furnace. A core was placed at the opposite end. As soon as the pipe was sufficiently heated, water was injected into a special chamber behind the core. The idea was that the evaporating water replaced the gunpowder and pushed out the core. It is not known why this weapon was not appreciated in the 16th century, but students at Mit University and experts from the Mythbusters program confirmed that the gun was viable.
Espringal
The last military invention on our list is a catapult with the strange name "Espringal" or "Springald". Translated, this means "horse", "jumper", which fully corresponds to the essence of the weapon. According to da Vinci's project, it is a torsion machine that works on the principle of a "twisted elastic band". The lever was pulled with a rope, a stone was put in a special bag, and then the tension was abruptly broken off and the projectile flew away to the enemy. Unlike the traditional Roman Onager catapult, the springal did not take root. He was too inferior to the latter in strength and range.