Note 274 — XXXIX MILITARY ENGINES

Grafsvin. Falk translates this with “badger” and seems to believe that it was a shelter on wheels under which the attackers might work in comparative safety. Altnordische Waffenkunde, 196. It is more likely, however, that a “cat” is meant. The cat was a long pointed pole used to loosen the stones in a wall and thus to make a breach. It is also called a “sow” and the Old Norse term grafsvin, “digging boar,” was evidently an attempt to translate the Latin term scrofa or sus, “hog” or “sow.” For a description of the cat, see Oman, Art of War, 132.