When did the Turks Get Acquainted with the Technology of Siege Engines?

The need to fight that emerged with the rise of mankind led man to invent appropriate devices to gain advantages in their struggle against various animals and natural forces first, and then against fellow creatures, for one of the most important requirements of surpassing in a fight is weapons and equipment. Thus, weapon can be defined simply as “the devices developed by man in order to defend themselves against the nature and the enemies.” As the product of maintaining self-existence and struggle for this scope, weapon is a natural feature for animals and plants. Special features of animals like trunk or teeth of elephant, horns of bull, quill of hedgehog or of plants like the leaves of the Venus flytrap can be seen as the weapons being used by them in order to survive. In fact, man seems to be inspired by these features of animals and plants in the first place whilst producing the first weapons. Man, always seeking facilitative and reassuring tools in order to overcome the difficulties exceeding his physical power, first have used natural materials such as stone, bones and wood, but soon tried to imitate the natural weapons of animals and plants. Poisoned arrows in the size of hedgehog spines used by primitive tribes, wild animal traps resembling the Venus flytrap, battering-rams used to shake down gates of medieval castles etc. are the most obvious examples of this inspiration. It is very hard to determine where and when the Turks used the technology of siege engines first time. The stereotype opinion in that topic is that, as a nation having nomadic life, Turks kept away from siege engines that slowed down nomadic life and limited freedom of activity because of production, carrying and usage these weapons. Really the sources giving information about early Turkish history did not say anything about siege methods and weapons which the Turks used. However, it is known that Turks had political, military and commercial relations with China that was the center of the technology of siege engines and as a consequence of relations, there had been a process of civilized and cultural interaction between the two societies. It is certain that this interaction was experienced intensively in the area of the technology of war. So it cannot be thought that Turks were not aware of the technology of siege engines developing in China. Moreover, it is seen that Turkish states which were founded outside the Central Asia used artillery weapons and siege engines when needed during their advances into Europe and Middle East. In this regard it can be said that Turks had a