In the begining battle scene, the words "move those catapults forward" or something along those lines are said. A little while later they show some scenes of the "catapults" which are not catapults at all, but actually Manganels(not sure of spelling).
Actually, they're called ballista. They're great big grandparents to the crossbow. Mangonels are giant catapults that can fire really big boulders. Mangonels weren't invented back then anyway. You're right about them not being catapults, though.
Sorry but Greek Fire wasn't invented until several centuries after the Western Roman Empire fell. It was first used by the Byzantium Empire against the Turks in, I believe, the 11th Century.
It's Mangonals I think, and mangonals ARE a type of catapult, they don't need to say the proper name all the time, and he wasn't talking about the ballistas, ballistas are just huge wooden cross-bows on wheels, it was the mangonals.
Since they wouldn't have been speaking English back then in the first place, nitpicking what particular words are used or whether or not a particular word is accurate really isn't a slip up. They used an English word which approximated the object referred to which the audience would be able to understand.
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