The thunderous crack of a medieval trebuchet launching its projectile echoes across the field, drawing gasps of excitement from onlookers witnessing history come alive. This isn't a Hollywood movie ...

Watch a homemade medieval trebuchet fling a ball of fire into the night sky. The counterweight drops, the arm swings, and a flaming projectile arcs across the darkness like a slow-motion firework.

When the senior woodworking students of Model Laboratory School technology teacher Stephen Willis were considering an end-of-year project, he suggested a late-medieval siege engine called a trebuchet.

"What's the deal with trebuchet memes?" someone recently asked Reddit's "out of the loop" forum. If you're similarly out of the loop about the online resurgence of middle ages siege machines, don't ...