# Were there ever attempts to use giant magnets in ancient warfare? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 24, 2014, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883 "2014-04-24T18:51:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2014, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/21 "2014-04-24T23:07:01Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > Perhaps he saw _Mystery Men_ and thought “Hey, that worked pretty well; I wonder how well it would work versus swords?” Or Breaking Bad when they tried to fry a laptop in an evidence locker with a huge electromagnet. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/22 "2014-04-25T00:41:52Z")
> [@drachillix](#): > > Or Breaking Bad when they tried to fry a laptop in an evidence locker with a huge electromagnet. Or the _Super Friends_ episode about “[The Shamon U](http://superfriends.wikia.com/wiki/The_Shamon_'U').” ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/23 "2014-04-25T01:43:26Z")
I’ve seen it work plenty in cartoons. Tends to backfire on coyotes, though. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/24 "2014-04-25T01:50:38Z")
In the Danny Kaye comedy _The Court Jester_, his suit of armor is magnetized by a lightning strike, with humorous results. I vaguely recall a _Ripley’s Believe It or Not_ claiming that in ancient China there was once a gateway built of lodestone that would reveal if someone passing through it were hiding iron weapons in their clothing; but I couldn’t find a cite and in any event Ripley’s was somewhere between Wikipedia and P.T. Barnum in veracity. ---
**Author:** ![Incubus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c68b51/32.png) [@Incubus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Incubus)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/25 "2014-04-25T02:43:19Z")
What about a large net that had lots of smaller magnets interwoven in it? Assuming they had some practical way of keeping it from sticking to itself, the net could be thrown at groups of knights with the idea that the little magnets would stick to all the armor and swords, making them hopelessly tangled. You could have a rope attached to one end that had a winch you could use to drag your foes into spike pits or into the moat to drown them. ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/26 "2014-04-25T03:45:06Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > To pull weapons away from their bearers… Often, the best weapons on the ancient world were made of bronze – which is non-magnetic. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/27 "2014-04-25T05:03:48Z")
Note too that modern society would suffer much more from an electromagnetic pulse than an ancient society would have. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2014, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883/28 "2014-04-25T09:10:38Z")
> [@Blakeyrat](#): > > [“It’s a high temperature fabric adhesive liquid projector based on simple dry cleaning technology.”](http://mysterymen.wikia.com/wiki/A._Heller) My kind of anti-hero. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/were-there-ever-attempts-to-use-giant-magnets-in-ancient-warfare/686883.md?page=1)