The Roman History · Amm. 20.7.13

One battering-ram was higher than the rest, and was covered with bull's hides wetted, and being therefore safer from any accident of fire, or from lighted javelins, it led the way in the attacks on the wall with mighty blows, and with its terrible point it dug into the joints of the stones till it overthrew the tower. The tower fell with a mighty crash, and those in it were thrown down with a sudden jerk, and breaking their limbs, or being buried beneath the ruins, perished by various and unexpected kinds of death; then, a safer entrance having been thus found, the multitude of the enemy poured in with their arms.

Ammianus Marcellinus · translated by C. D. Yonge · 1911 reprint
C. D. Yonge translation (preface dated February 1862); G. Bell and Sons, 1911; Project Gutenberg #28587
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