The bricola or brigola (of the Provencal bricola, and this one of the old German half brechen, "to break") was a machine of medieval war designed to expugnar and to pierce walls or strengths.
Of Italian origin, it is a type of catapult that was widely used throughout the 12th to 15th centuries in the southern part of Europe. Their projectiles were propelled with the principle of the seesaw, but with the particularity of introducing a counterweight system of lead plates attached to the wooden pieces and the beam. He acted through human traction. It was used in the attack on fortresses and besieged towers and was served by about 15 men. Their projectiles used to be balls of stone or incandescent material with a weight of 20 to 60 kilos, thrown at a distance of 50 meters approximately and with a cadence of shot of once every 10 or 15 minutes. Being revolving, they allowed to change the direction of the projectile The brigola is mentioned in the Llibre dels fets or Chronicle of Jaume I, because they were used for the Conquest of Mallorca by Jaime I of Aragón between 1229 and 1231.
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