Stone cannonball?

[LeonymusBosch]

Hello everyone,

I was recently asked to identify a possible cannonball and I would like some more opinions on this.



The finder said "iron cannonball, 16th c. removed from ground and walls of an Ottoman fort"

First off all, the ball is made of stone, not iron. It's 72 cm in circumference and 24 cm diameter and weighs 16 kg. The size of it makes it impossible to be iron or lead as it would have to be much heavier if solid. If it were iron, the only possibility for that kind of weight/size ratio for an iron one, the ball would have to be hollow, made as a shell for 18/19th c. howitzers and mortars. This is definitely not it, it's not perfectly round, it looks like stone with parts left unfinished, not magnetic ofc and there were certainly no large siege or rather fort mortars at the find location.





My thinking is this could possibly not be a cannonball at all, or it could be for late 15th or 16th century cannons. If yes, likely Ottoman as they had cannons large enough which would fire projectiles of this size, and there were multiple battles and sieges nearby in mid to late 16th c. but I'm unsure if they actually brought them to that location.

What do you think?

[LeonymusBosch]

Could it be a catapult projectile?

[adrian]

I was recently asked to identify a possible cannonball and I would like some more opinions on this.

I think that it is highly likely to be a stone cannonball, often the obvious answer is the correct one. These took some work to get sufficiently round, and catapults etc did not require such uniformity for their projectiles. Likewise, if it were part of a masonry work of art or decoration, that has broken away, there would be some evidence of that.

Below from my collection, a 6" dia (15cm) stone shot weighing 10.5lbs recovered from the Malacca Strait, it is probably Portuguese, and three smaller examples about 4" dia, from an 16th century English shipwreck.

[M ELEY]

I thought I'd post my "balls" as well-

I've had them for a number of years, but never posted them as I wasn't positively sure they were really stone cannon balls. Over the couse of years, I decided to approach them from a different angle, basically ruling out what they were not! I know they aren't Native American game balls for play, as they are perfectly smooth and larger than the typical Indian ball. They are not stone mill balls because THERE ARE NO SUCH THING! Yes, there were iron mill balls that are confused with iron cannon balls, but the only stone grist tools were stone wheels (I've done a lot of research, but if I'm wrong, let me know!). I don't buy that they were simply some hoddyist's project, because they are made from plain granite and creating them would have been very time-consuming! And they are not to my knowledge Victorean 'garden balls' as the ones I've seen of those are smaller and not perfectly smooth. Mine are about the size of a baseball or slightly larger. I've seen pics of very similar cannon balls dating from around the time of the English Civil War ca, 1650's.

Stone cannon balls became obsolete in the mid-17th century when used against castles and stone forts. They continued to be used, however, in the maritime setting. Stone balls fired ship-to-ship would tear holes through the hull, creating a shower of stone shards and wood shivers. By the time of the early 18th c, ship's hulls became thicker and the stone cannon balls were no longer viable.