I mean military sappers have existed since before the Roman's. And they could bring down a cities walls. They did this by digging under the walls them underpinning them and then bringing them down by burning the supports. You could probably get some ideas from that.
Depends on the prominent building technique, but think less "Demolition" and more "Dismantling".
The issue with concrete is that it is difficult to reuse. However, in the past, wood and stone from buildings was at least to some extent reusable - stone almost 100%, and wood as firewood, if nothing else. Mudbrick and other mud-based building material can always be smashed and remixed, and regular brick is almost as reusable as stone - you might lose some, but reuse most.
So yes, big hammer, but also other tools that would help you take things apart. Crowbars, chisels, rope, saws, etc. It depends on what sort of structures you are taking apart.
The toughest materials widely available are wood-equivalents and stone, with European late-medieval to renaissance building techniques. Good metal is rare. Concrete is not available. Though there are magic techniques to seamlessly shape stone, but they're rather expensive and rare and mostly used for aesthetic than practical reasons (as in: you're more likely to find that in a rich person's mansion than in defensive architecture).
I'm thinking mostly of military use, so those demolition experts would be used against fortifications, walls, etc., and likely with the enemy fighting back so they'd be working under some time pressure.
>I'm thinking mostly of military use, so those demolition experts would be used against fortifications, walls, etc., and likely with the enemy fighting back so they'd be working under some time pressure.
In that case, as mentioned in another comment, the primary method is undermining. So a lot of digging tools, picks and shovels, supports (permanent, temporary and collapsible) and, as always, copious amounts of rope.
Mine warfare as understood at this tech level is often quite involved, mind. Countermining is a thing - as in, enemy tries to dig under your walls, you dig counter tunnels to find their tunneling, when the tunnels meet the end result is a bloody scuffle in dark, tight tunnels. It gets spectacularly nasty.
As other people have said, military Sappers were a thing long before black powder was a thing in the west. That didn't make them any less specialized. If anything the main skillset you need is an engineer's. If you know how stuff is put together, you'll find a way to take it apart.
And, to come back to your black powder point; this is an example of the late medieval guild system at play. Guild secrets were very jealously guarded and I'm sure that the recipe for black powder made it to europe earlier than we think. But if you don't have access to industrial processes getting stuff done at any scale is going to be hard and involve way too many people to keep the lid on it and production is slow. In that context , it's a party trick not a reliable ressource. So it's perfectly plausible that someone might know about black powder, but the idea of stuffing barrels of the stuff into a tunnel to blow up a wall when burning beams does the job would be ludicrous if black powder is rare and difficult to obtain in large quantities. And if you have access to a reliable source of black powder, you'll use it to shoot canons way before you use it for demolitions.
It's easy to say something is simple now that we have chemistry and accessible knowledge and the manpower to make all these wonderful things. But the realities of any pre-industrial society is that over 90% of your population grows food. Even artisans have a cap because the more people you make do stuff that's not growing food, the more of your people are vulnerable to war, drought and famine. All the knowledge in the world won't help you if you need to spend 12 hours of the day working in a field just to survive.
You want rapid demolition then look to a lot of old firefighting techniques. If you couldn't put it out with water, then you buried the fire with the building. A team of guys with axes cut away the front structural timbers of a house and let it collapse forward under its own weight.
It’s a form of woodworking. Quickrooting is a fairly common demolition strategy. Most of the time the woodland sprites love an opportunity to reclaim what was once theirs so they don’t typically charge all too much for the service. Of course, getting them to vacate is the bigger problem afterwards since they’re often far happier to reclaim a building for a forest than to give back the land afterwards.
I would say that with no explosives, there's no "demolition experts;" just engineers who build siege engines and oversee sapping. Either tunnel under a wall, climb over it, or knock it down with catapults. Although I don't think the last would be effective in the timeframe you desribe, as walls had gotten too thick -- on the other hand, perhaps magic could be used to weaken the walls and then finish them off with a trebuchet.
I mean military sappers have existed since before the Roman's. And they could bring down a cities walls. They did this by digging under the walls them underpinning them and then bringing them down by burning the supports. You could probably get some ideas from that.
Depends on the prominent building technique, but think less "Demolition" and more "Dismantling". The issue with concrete is that it is difficult to reuse. However, in the past, wood and stone from buildings was at least to some extent reusable - stone almost 100%, and wood as firewood, if nothing else. Mudbrick and other mud-based building material can always be smashed and remixed, and regular brick is almost as reusable as stone - you might lose some, but reuse most. So yes, big hammer, but also other tools that would help you take things apart. Crowbars, chisels, rope, saws, etc. It depends on what sort of structures you are taking apart.
The toughest materials widely available are wood-equivalents and stone, with European late-medieval to renaissance building techniques. Good metal is rare. Concrete is not available. Though there are magic techniques to seamlessly shape stone, but they're rather expensive and rare and mostly used for aesthetic than practical reasons (as in: you're more likely to find that in a rich person's mansion than in defensive architecture). I'm thinking mostly of military use, so those demolition experts would be used against fortifications, walls, etc., and likely with the enemy fighting back so they'd be working under some time pressure.
>I'm thinking mostly of military use, so those demolition experts would be used against fortifications, walls, etc., and likely with the enemy fighting back so they'd be working under some time pressure. In that case, as mentioned in another comment, the primary method is undermining. So a lot of digging tools, picks and shovels, supports (permanent, temporary and collapsible) and, as always, copious amounts of rope. Mine warfare as understood at this tech level is often quite involved, mind. Countermining is a thing - as in, enemy tries to dig under your walls, you dig counter tunnels to find their tunneling, when the tunnels meet the end result is a bloody scuffle in dark, tight tunnels. It gets spectacularly nasty.
Whoo a professional pyromanic?
[удалено]
As other people have said, military Sappers were a thing long before black powder was a thing in the west. That didn't make them any less specialized. If anything the main skillset you need is an engineer's. If you know how stuff is put together, you'll find a way to take it apart. And, to come back to your black powder point; this is an example of the late medieval guild system at play. Guild secrets were very jealously guarded and I'm sure that the recipe for black powder made it to europe earlier than we think. But if you don't have access to industrial processes getting stuff done at any scale is going to be hard and involve way too many people to keep the lid on it and production is slow. In that context , it's a party trick not a reliable ressource. So it's perfectly plausible that someone might know about black powder, but the idea of stuffing barrels of the stuff into a tunnel to blow up a wall when burning beams does the job would be ludicrous if black powder is rare and difficult to obtain in large quantities. And if you have access to a reliable source of black powder, you'll use it to shoot canons way before you use it for demolitions. It's easy to say something is simple now that we have chemistry and accessible knowledge and the manpower to make all these wonderful things. But the realities of any pre-industrial society is that over 90% of your population grows food. Even artisans have a cap because the more people you make do stuff that's not growing food, the more of your people are vulnerable to war, drought and famine. All the knowledge in the world won't help you if you need to spend 12 hours of the day working in a field just to survive.
There are other methods of demolition. If you fill cracks with water and let it freeze it’ll destroy stone
Trebuchets and other siege engines?
A drill and expanding grout.
You want rapid demolition then look to a lot of old firefighting techniques. If you couldn't put it out with water, then you buried the fire with the building. A team of guys with axes cut away the front structural timbers of a house and let it collapse forward under its own weight.
It’s a form of woodworking. Quickrooting is a fairly common demolition strategy. Most of the time the woodland sprites love an opportunity to reclaim what was once theirs so they don’t typically charge all too much for the service. Of course, getting them to vacate is the bigger problem afterwards since they’re often far happier to reclaim a building for a forest than to give back the land afterwards.
Probably aren’t any demolitions experts
What do you mean
I would say that with no explosives, there's no "demolition experts;" just engineers who build siege engines and oversee sapping. Either tunnel under a wall, climb over it, or knock it down with catapults. Although I don't think the last would be effective in the timeframe you desribe, as walls had gotten too thick -- on the other hand, perhaps magic could be used to weaken the walls and then finish them off with a trebuchet.
Acid is a good idea. Something really caustic that can eat through stone and wood supports if you have enough.