likely stemmed from the fact that Leonardo grew up in Italy during the 15th century. This meant he was a witness to the constant warfare between the many city-states in his area. Thus, Leonardo put extensive time and effort into designs that could both protect his fellow citizens and greatly harm the enemy. The Giant Crossbow supports this theory in that the intended enormous size of the weapon was meant to invoke fear and panic in its enemies to keep them away, but it would still have the capability to cause great damage and injury had it been actually constructed and used. Working replicas After a prototype of the Rapid Fire Crossbow built in 2013, the first working model was released on 24 June 2015 during a demonstration at the Castello Sforzesco in Milan. The working replica of the infantry weapon was the culmination of a study conducted by Edoardo Zanon of the Leonardo3 study center in respect of the processing and assembly techniques available at the time of Leonardo. The model allows precision shooting and is equipped with a fast internal spanning mechanism, non-existent even in most modern handheld crossbows. The working model built is on display at the Leonardo3 – The World of Leonardo museum at the Piazza della Scala in Milan, Italy. As for the Giant Crossbow, it was never constructed by its designer; either as scaled model or as a fully fledged siege weapon. However, a working model was built to a scale of 1:1. It was shown in the ITN documentary Leonardo's Dream Machines, which was aired for the first time in February 2003 by Channel 4. See also Codex Atlanticus Cheiroballistra Lever action firearms Polybolos Repeating crossbow Science and inventions of Leonardo da Vinci References External links Balestra gigante Giant Crossbow Leonardo da Vinci projects Crossbows