A closer look
German knight Götz von Berlichingen lost his right arm to cannon fire in 1504, so he had a local blacksmith forge him an intricate mechanical iron prosthetic capable of holding both a sword and a delicate quill pen. He spent the next forty-seven years terrorizing merchants, kidnapping nobles for ransom, and aggressively feuding with anyone who mildly annoyed him, entirely unbothered by his massive physical handicap. He is also historically famous for being the first person in recorded literature to tell an enemy captain to kiss his ass, a remarkably vulgar quote later immortalized in a famous play by Goethe. There is something deeply inspiring about a heavily armed medieval cyborg whose primary contribution to society was inventing the world's most enduring and timeless insult
