Conclusion to those e history of the development of navigation. Shipping history
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Romola Anderson, Roger Charles Anderson
Sailing ships. History of navigation and shipbuilding from ancient times to the XIX century
© Translation, Centrpoligraf, 2014
© Art decoration, Centrpoligraph, 2014
Foreword
This book covers a very serious and large-scale topic. Each chapter could be the basis for a separate book, and all of them will have the same volume (if not more) than our work, in which we tried to cover the whole range of issues. Of course, we were able to offer the reader only a very brief summary of these questions. Nevertheless, we hope that it is quite complete and accurate.
In less than a hundred years, Greece fell to the Macedonians, and its light was extinguished forever. The successors of Alexander the Great improved both warships and commercial ships, but the main trend was to increase their size. In the meantime, Rome has learned to use Greek-style birems and triremes; nevertheless, the Romans preferred an earth battle, and only they improvised the first fleet of the war of 264 years. After the exclusion of small Greek kingdoms one by one, the new capital of the world seized commercial transport from the East, and since then has become the largest maritime power in the world.
We set a goal to trace from the sources or approaching them as closely as possible the two main directions of development of shipbuilding, southern and northern, until they, having joined in the 15th century, did not lead to the birth of a standard European ship with full sailing arms. After that, we tried to give an idea of the gradual improvement of this standard type of ships, its culmination - the XIX century clipper and the slow but steady decline with the advent of the steamer.
The pirates, however, continued to do so: their constant invasions violated the thriving maritime trade. In a magnificent campaign that lasted only three months, Pompeo, in 67 BC, cleaned the Mediterranean Sea from intruders; since then, the sea, which bathed the shores of the whole known world, has been called Mare Nostrum, our sea, for the proud Romans. In 42 AD, the artificial port of Ostia was built, which became the center of maritime navigation, from the Black Sea to the English Channel.
Roman fleets surrounded India to reach Malaysia, Sumatra, Java and the coasts of China; regular transport line transported wheat between Alexandria and the capital of the empire. Of the several hundred tons, they had many passengers; In a shipwreck narrated by the apostle San Pablo, the author claims that there were 267 people on board.
We did not even try to describe the ships and boats of non-European peoples, allowing only random references to some of them, which could help illustrate the issue in question. Of course, we considered the entire Mediterranean basin to be European, and therefore our concept of Europeans also extended to the ancient Egyptians and Phoenicians. In addition, we did not ignore the modern North American ships, because they are European in origin.
Rome remained the owner of the seas until the gradual dismemberment of its power. But while beyond the horizon, other unknown cities risked on the surface of the ocean in boats much more fragile than solid imperial ships. An incredible pilgrimage lasted for a thousand years, and in some places, for example, between the Marquises and Hawaii, the great fleets of hundreds of canoes traveled more than three thousand kilometers, without touching the ground. Anthropologists and archaeologists have concluded that Polynesian sea nomads used giant double cakes, equipped with sails and designed for 50 rowers.
Drawings were made, if possible, from originals or photographs. We tried to reproduce the original as accurately as possible and did not care about the artistic performance - hence the wide variation of styles. As for the graphs and charts - their only purpose was clarity.
We are grateful to everyone who wrote on this topic before us, thereby providing material for this book. We also express our deep appreciation to all who personally helped us - drawings, photographs and advice. Among them, we would like to mention Rear-Admiral J. Hegg from the Swedish Navy, Dr. Jules Sott from Paris, CG Huft and G. K. E. Crone from Amsterdam, Sir Alan Moore, H.H. Brindley, Morton Tens and L. G. Carr Lawton.
In the center was a platform where women, children, and pets were hiding. The route of these oceanic migrations is one of the greatest mysteries of history. In China, since ancient times, there were reeds capable of driving great rivers and along the coasts. On the other hand, the design has not changed for many centuries. Five-masted sailboats traveled along the Karau rivers, when Europe knew only primitive log ponds. Steering wheel, compass, bridges and cabins belonged to the current equipment of the Chinese vessel long before the Western fleets reached such a high level of development, and only thanks to the Arabs, who for thousands of years served as intermediaries between East and West. that European navigation began to develop finally.
R.A.
R.C. BUT.
Writers and artists of the past and present, whose work made possible the appearance of this book
Chapter 1. Egypt and Crete 4000–1000 BC. er
To get an idea of the earliest known images of ships, you should refer to Ancient Egypt. And not because we find the most primitive forms of ships there — it’s easier to do in different remote corners of the modern world — and since the heyday of civilization took place precisely in Egypt and there people began to take notes on everything they saw around them.
The Arabs themselves dominated trade with the East in the Middle Ages: they traded between China and the West in luxurious ships equipped with Chinese compasses and richly decorated. In Baghdad, one of its capitals, while its empire stretched from Spain to India, Chinese silks and jade, spices from Sumatra, dyes brought from India, rubies, hides, slaves, honey, goods arrived from Russia. Scandinavia, Central Asia. Meanwhile, on the ruins of the Roman Empire, a barbarous medieval night occurred.
While Constantinople was proud of its “dromons”, large galleries of birem, driven by hundreds of rowers equipped with “Greek fire” to set fire to enemy ships, and the Arabs defended their ships with metal plates, giving birth to the first battleships, the descendants of Greece and Rome plunged into barbarism coming from the North. The end of the Carolingian line meant an eclipse of Western civilization, leaving the countryside and the seas, Byzantium and the Arabs. But new sailors, explorers and traders began to arrive from the north: tall, bearded people who brought hides, slaves, sealed their teeth from their dens lost in the northern latitudes of Scandinavia.
Navigation in its simplest form is so ancient art that even in Egypt, where some of the records date back thousands of years before Christ, we do not at all approach the days when a person first began to use boats. Shipbuilding originated earlier than drawing, and much earlier than writing.
On Egyptian ceramics, dated 4000 BC. Oe., we find drawings that can relate to the courts with a large number of oars, but look like some very intricate buildings with walls. The figures of people and birds on the same vases are discharged with great care, and it is hard to believe that the artists who painted them made it so difficult to recognize the court. True, in the Middle Ages there were artists who created magnificent images of people on ships, which appeared to be nothing more than caricatures, but in these cases the artists, most likely, never saw the ships. But in Egypt, where the people always depended on the Nile, everyone knew what the boats looked like.
Over time, they will arrive in Russia, where they are called "Varangians" in the north of France, in England, in all the known seas; in Italy, they would create an empire that bore a name that European nations knew: the Normans, the people of the North. These fabulous Scandinavian sailors, perhaps the greatest marine explorers in history, today remember a name that resonates with the brackish echoes of the great oceans: the Vikings, the heirs of the old people, the long-term symbol of human passion, sea, ships and shipping.
The history of transport in Paraguay is connected with the history of its navigable rivers. Important water canals of national geography have allowed us to open and conquer these unknown lands so far from the “ocean sea”. European penetration into Paraguay occurred as a result of the obsessive interest of the Spanish crown in the search for a transition to the East, which would allow it to gain access to a very rich spice trade. It is very easy to understand, given the abundance of navigable water currents and the great distribution that were lost in the serenity of New Continent, that these were the ways that the discoverers and conquerors of South America cost.
Fig. one. Egyptian sailboat. 4000 BC er or earlier
These dubious boats become even more dubious given the fact that in the same ceramics collection kept in the British Museum there is one specimen with a very good image of a sailboat. This shows that in ancient times, sailing ships were not inaccessible to artists. In general, we find surprisingly few differences between this boat (Fig. 1) and those that are present on the Egyptian carving two and even three thousand years later. The hull has the same shape - it is very round at the bottom and rises high out of the water at each end. The only difference is that the nose on the oldest boat is much higher than on later vessels. The sail is almost the same as in all early Egyptian sculptures - straight quadrangular with a yoke above and a boom below. The mast is depicted as a single bar, but there is no indication of how it was supported, nor how the sailing and control of the sail was carried out.
On the island of Yuru Mirin, there were reports that the Indians promised to those who followed them, "so that they would carry gold and silver ships." They were well received by the Guarani native, who learned their language and their customs; they used some gold jewelery, which said that they had found them above their brothers, who in turn talked about some amazing mines where the White King was. One of these survivors was a Portuguese from Alentejo, called Alexio Garcia, who, attracted by a huge amount of treasure, left his leg with four other satellites and unprecedented audacity heading west incognito.
To find out, we will have to take a leap over a millennium or even more — not a very big leap if we look at it, since our knowledge of Egypt goes back about six thousand years into the past. So, about 3000 BC. er an Egyptian vessel carved on stone is dated, and quite a lot of detail is seen in the image (Fig. 2). The shape of the case is the same, only the ends do not rise vertically upwards, as before. Thirteen oars are visible from each side, and three very large steering oars. Sail above and already. There is a roof above and maybe a boom below. The mast consists of two bars (spars), connected together in the upper part and at a short distance from the lower end. These two beams were probably located not one in front of the other, but side by side. The Egyptian artist slightly turned or even distorted the image, wanting to show details hidden from his eyes on the side view. The ropes going from the mast to the sides of the vessel are undoubtedly the guys holding it against the pulling force of the sail. They are much closer to the feed than it would have been done today, but it is easy to explain. The ancient Egyptians never sailed unless the wind blew in the stern. And in any case, a mast in the shape of an inverted V would require more support in the longitudinal direction than in the transverse one. And so the mast has one delay that goes to the bow of the vessel to keep it from falling backwards, and the halyard, raising the rey, moves away from the top of the mast in the direction of the stern to perform the function of backstay. Two ropes coming from the ends of the yards are brasses, with the help of which the sail can be turned if the wind does not blow directly into the stern.
He had an escort of knowledgeable natives of the region. After crossing the great rivers, he arrived in Paraguay, where a contingent of thousands of brown was added. He was the first European to arrive in the territory of the future province. The great wanderer crossed over 600 leagues, almost all of South America. Garksha's expedition entered the country of guinea pigs, until it reached the predandi districts of Chanas and Korotok.
The trip was made in the brigantine after the “mighty river leading to the Sierra del Plata”. He was able to reach the mouth of the river Bermejo or Pilcomayo, from where he undertook his return to Spain, trying to explain to the Court the reasons for his crazy adventure. He was the first European navigator who swam in the murky waters of our river.
Fig. 2 Egyptian ship. About 3000 BC. er
There is no doubt that the Egyptian court 3000 BC. er were well built and had a considerable size. This was the beginning of the pyramid era, when the stone was transported long distances up the Nile. The first boats of the Nile Valley were probably ordinary rafts made of bundled reed bundles. Something similar is used in our day. Gradually, the rafts changed shape and became more like boats, and over time - also in ancient times - wooden boats began to appear, which were very different from all that we used to see today. Egypt is a country poor in forests, and especially in large forests, so the method of construction using keels, frames and cladding, which was developed elsewhere from giant canoes cut from the trunk of the tree, was impossible or at least very difficult. . Therefore, the Egyptians built their boats from short narrow pieces of wood, each of which was attached to the side from the side. Such boats did not have a keel, and the strength was ensured by thick sides and strong fasteners. The hull shape with large protrusions — overhangs at both ends — perhaps partly due to the fact that the boats were copied from their reed ancestors, and partly — the convenience of this form for loading and unloading — it is enough to lead one end to the riverbank.
They settled in a place called Santa Maria del Buen Ayr, a fateful election, because they had great difficulties there, with the loss of people and materials due to the famine and hostility of the indigenous peoples. It was urgent to find sources of supply for an attempt to begin an energetic search for a road to the mountains. To this end, he sent an expedition under the command of Captain Juan de Ayola, accompanied by Gonzalo de Mendoza and Domingo Martnes de Iraly as lieutenants. The Spaniards fought for water in the three brigantines.
Three hundred leagues upstream achieved first contact with the indigenous peoples of the region on the cacique lands of Avambarie and Carb-kara. They found natural people who were easily cut down and whose friendship they knew how to use. With the support of these Aborigines, they built a solid house that will serve as repairs and food for future exploration.
Obviously, the two boats shown in Fig. 3 (from the same monument), are built differently. The bottom one is probably made of a material that needs to be tied, and the slope of the nose suggests something flexible. The upper one looks tougher, and there are no signs of binding on it. There is another very important difference: they have different oars. On the bottom boat paddle canoes, and on the top - the usual oarlocks. The transition from kayak oars to oarlocks is, in essence, simple. Only a kind of support is needed, fixing for the paddle. Then the kayak paddle becomes a full-fledged rowing oar. However, it took a long time for people to think of it. So often happens with simple things. When this step was nevertheless taken, it became an important milestone, as it allowed to make the ships larger.
Iolas climbed the broad river, and far north he reached a natural port, which he called La Candelaria, from where he ventured, accompanied by Indians, to open the way to Peru. He followed the paths that Aleho Garkan discovered ten years earlier, but not before leaving Iraly’s instructions on caring for ships and recommending a deal with the natives. A series of disappointments and disappointments in the enrichment dreams of courageous travelers who came with an obsession with gold and silver to end their days devoted to the colonization of the newly known lands began with Ayolas.
Fig. 3 Egyptian boats. About 3000 BC. er
While we were considering boats for use on the Nile. They were of great importance because they appeared very early, but the real ship could appear and develop only at sea, and thanks to sailing across the sea the art of shipbuilding passed from one nation to another. Let's go and we go to the ships.
Iolas was also killed by the Indians, at a time of great unrest, on the banks of the river, where he was abandoned. Martnez de Iralah went down to repair his boats, to dress up courses, cover up and make oars and rigging, and lay the forge for the manufacture of nails for brigantine.
Having failed in previous attempts, but living dreams of wealth, Irela assumed the task of colonizing the vast province of Paraguay. But the dream of arriving at the fabulous gold mines still stood. Gold was not reached because the Spaniards, who arrived in the South Sea, had already found it and were responsible for its operation.
By the year 3000, the Egyptians sent their ships to the Eastern Mediterranean to Crete, which is located 300 miles north-west from the mouth of the Nile, and to Phenicia, that is, 200 miles to the northeast. We know for sure that a hundred years after that, Egyptian ships brought cedar wood to their native shores, which must have been loaded in Phoenician harbors. A little later - about 2700 BC. er - The Egyptian king Sahur sent a fleet of eight ships, which brought back Phoenician prisoners. Images of these vessels were carved on the walls of the temple and preserved to this day.
Kario-Guaran knew a lot about these trips, because before the arrival of the Spaniards they had made several military expeditions to the Andean Highlands and were considered inhabitants of Charcas as terrible enemies. Although the Guarani did not appreciate precious metals, they spoke of the mysterious White God and his wealth, a subject that aroused his natural curiosity. In these great invasions of the peninsular natives, the needs of the expedition’s food and support weapons were covered, and they also spoke in language to allow such a small number of conquerors to subjugate a large number of less friendly ethnic groups.
Fig. four. Egyptian ship. Around 2700 BC. er
We see boats, very similar to Nile boats, with some extras (Fig. 4). A massive rope stretching from end to end over a row of forked stands is a link designed to keep the ends of the boat from dropping. This lowering, or kink, of the hull has always been a negative feature of wooden vessels. The Victory case leaned 18 inches (45 cm). Not over this fate and boats that during the war bought from America. The Egyptian method of preventing this process was very practical and reliable. Something similar is used on the small-set river steamers to this day. How exactly the connection was attached to the fore and aft ends of the vessel is unclear. It seems that she was wrapped around a massive cross, which was held in place by other ropes passing under the bottom of the vessel. How it was pulled is quite obvious. This was done according to the principle of a tow - placing a stick between the individual ropes that made up the connection, twisted it to achieve the necessary tension, and then secured the end of the stick to prevent it from unwinding. The pattern along the side was probably made by two ropes, with another twisting crosswise between them.
The local was culturally close to the river, and his status as a gatherer gave him special skills to navigate his streams and lagoons in search of daily food. For the same reason, they were skilled builders of primitive canoes, whose bill was almost the sacred dedication of the people. Despite the imperfections of the media, they were remarkable laconic and perfection of their works, we succeeded in manual works, they showed patience and a sense of copy. The first tool used as a transport was a horse.
Small, but very important detail - the eye, painted on the top of the stem - a vertical pillar in the nasal tip. This decorative eye can still be seen on small ships in different parts of the world, most often on Chinese junks (Fig. 5). The mast in the shape of an inverted V is another detail that came from ancient Egypt and is still found in the East. For example, ships on the Irrawaddy River in Burma have a mast and sail, very similar to those that were on the Nile boats five thousand years earlier. According to some authors, all this proves that the peoples of the East learned the art of shipbuilding from the Egyptians, although not directly. They even argued that shipbuilding is the original Egyptian art, and the main directions of the history of shipbuilding for the whole world were set in Egypt in the 4th millennium BC. er
The picture shows the ford of the Paraguay River Depositary. How were these expeditions conducted? Juan de Iola's journey took place in very bad conditions. They had small boats, known as brigantines, rowing and sails, which moved very easily upstream. They resorted to the help of Cario-Guaranna, who accompanied the Spanish flotilla with a significant number of canoes.
The trip upstream from Salazar de Espinoza, the founder of the strong house of Asunciune, lasted 400 days to the port of La Candelaria. The brig was a smaller vessel, shallow draft, with low dead work, for use with oars. It could be transported to pieces by caravel and be armed in the mouths of rivers. Pataxi or Patacho were the reference vessel for sails of no more than 25 tons.
Fig. five. Chinese junk. From figure 1825
This is a very bold statement. Undoubtedly, the Egyptians, who had a developed civilization, really pointed the way to more backward peoples, but we must not forget that to find differences as easily as similarities, and some differences are very large. The Burmese can use the masts and the sails that have come down to them from Egypt, but set them up on a ship that is completely different from what the Egyptians knew. Even the most ardent supporters of the theory that Egypt is responsible for the entire development of shipbuilding cannot but recognize one simple truth: it is extremely unlikely that the hollowed out canoes were invented or used in Egypt. Namely, narrow hollowed boats are still the basis of Burmese shipbuilding. Yes, and Chinese shipbuilding for many centuries had and has no visible connection with the Egyptian.
Leaving this question to which you can devote a whole book, we will return to the known facts and consider some Egyptian sea vessels around 1500 BC. er Queen Hatshepsut, then ruled Egypt, wanted to have many rarities, in particular, myrrh from a distant mysterious country of Punt. It is unknown where this country was located - perhaps on the territory of modern Somalia or much further along the coast of East Africa. In any case, the way there lay on the Red Sea, and the queen equipped a fleet of five ships to be sent there. In those days there was a canal from the Nile to the Red Sea, which the ships could use, as well as the route through the Mediterranean. There was nothing new in the Suez Canal.
The expedition was successful, and the queen was so pleased with the results that she ordered to knock out the full story about her on the walls of the temple in Deir el-Bahri, near Thebes.
All ships are the same, but shown under different conditions. We see them rowing and sailing at the same time (as in Fig. 6), going on the oars, lowering the sail, and standing at the shore under loading. We even see the rowers of the second ship rowing in the opposite direction, as it cautiously approaches the shore. In general, there is not much difference between the courts of Queen Hatshepsut and the pharaoh of Sahura, who ruled fifteen centuries earlier. The hull shape is the same, and it is precisely reinforced with a longitudinal link. But there are a lot of differences in details. The most remarkable - the double mast gave way to a single bar, which is somehow fixed in place. There are two braces and one backstay, two halyards go towards the stern. Although it can be expected that the conventional mast needs more mats than the mast in the shape of an inverted V. It appears that the mast is very secure on the ship, so tightly as if it has never been lowered. Both the ray and the geek consist of two parts fastened together - this practice still exists on the ships of the Red and Mediterranean seas. Eight ropes stretch from the top of the mast to the yoke. When the rai is raised, only two of them are strung, the others are loosely hanging. When the ray is down, they are all taut. At least sixteen of the same rope goes from the top of the mast to the boom. It is difficult to say what function they all perform, but it seems obvious that one pair on the rail is lifts designed to keep the rail in a horizontal position or its inclination if necessary. Two bras on a rey and two on a boom are shown, the latter being so close to the middle that they could be used to restrain the boom rather than to turn it.
Fig. 6 Egyptian ship. Around 1500 BC. er
The steering device has received a noticeable development. Now it’s not a steering paddle, but a real steering wheel. The steering oar is in the hand of the helmsman and can be moved in any direction, and the steering wheel is fixed in such a way that it can only turn in the socket. There is a tiller - a long handle that holds the steering. These rudders, one on each side, were attached in two places: to the side of the ship and to the pole rising slightly above the board.
Below the rowers can see a number of oblong icons on the hull. At first glance, they appear to be ports — openings for the second row of oars, but in reality these are the ends of the beams that support the deck and connect the sides of the ship. The nose is very similar to the noses of the vessels of Sahura, but the big lotus flower on the stern is a new feature.
Talking about the actual size of the courts is difficult. If they were depicted on a scale of 1:14 (2 digits = 1 cubit), which seems very likely, since the Egyptian cubit contains 28 digits, then the ships had a length of about 88 feet (26.8 m), and the distance between the oars was 3.5 ft (1.1 m). And the vessels of the Sahora had a length of 60 feet (18.3 m).
Another scene on the monuments of Deir el-Bahri shows a huge ship that is towed along the Nile with two large obelisks aboard. These obelisks of Hatshepsut were much larger than the one that stands on the Thames Embankment in London and is called the Cleopatra's Needle. They had a length of more than 100 feet (30 m) and weighed more than 350 tons each. We know from the inscription that the vessel on which two smaller obelisks were transported had a length of 207 feet (63.1 m) and a width of 69 feet (21 m). Most of the entry relates to the transportation of these two obelisks of a smaller size, but it assumes that a larger vessel was being built. The surviving part of it says: "... trees throughout the land to build a very large vessel ... for loading two obelisks on Elephantine." Two obelisks, immersed in a row closely, as shown in the figure, required a length of 200 feet (61 m) or more, and the transportation should be carried out so that there was no load on the hull parts in the bow and stern that protruded from the water. If the drawing is proportional - and this seems to be the case, except for the disproportionate image of some people - then the ship had a length of at least 300 feet (91.4 m), but rather 330 feet (100.6 m). It had the same general form as the ships that had sailed to Punt, but three rows of beams. They must have been connected with each other and with the deck on which the obelisks lay, with the help of pillars, otherwise the bottom row of beams could not be used to accept the load. At least 30 rowing boats towed this overwhelmingly large lighter along the river.
It should be noted that this vessel was much larger than the largest wooden military sailboat ever built. As for the loading and unloading of obelisks, it is completely incomprehensible how it could be carried out without hydraulics, steam, and even pulleys and cables. When Cleopatra's Needle was delivered to London, a metal cylinder was built around it, which was then lowered into the water with an obelisk inside. After that, a wheelhouse was built, and the entire structure was further towed by a steamer. The Egyptian method was probably not so clever, but no less effective.
By the beginning of the reign of Queen Hatshepsut, not only the Egyptians, but also other peoples began to participate in navigation in the Eastern Mediterranean. Phenicia has not yet reached the zenith of fame, in contrast to the Greek islands, primarily Crete. By 2000 BC. er The Greeks had a highly developed civilization and very good ships, not at all like the Egyptian ones. Unfortunately, Cretan artists have not left us such good images as the Egyptian ones. Obviously, there were two different types of seagoing vessels: long vessels, designed mainly for rowing, and round vessels for sailing. The Egyptians, such a difference, apparently, was not. But, starting with the Cretans and further, it can be traced very clearly through the Greek and Roman ships almost until the end of the era of wooden shipbuilding.
The long ship had a more straight hull line than the Egyptian ships. His feed sharply curled up and rose high above the water, and his nose was less high. It was a lot of rowers, and the management was carried out by large steering oars or onboard steering wheels. Mast and sails are not depicted. One new feature manifests itself - both on the images on ceramics and on clay models, a pointed nasal ram that pierced holes in the sides of enemy ships. From now on, this bow ram will invariably be present on all images of the Mediterranean long ships - the galleys. Round ships are always depicted with masts and very often without oars. The two ends are almost the same, and the whole hull form looks more like the Egyptian ships of that time.
Soon after the expedition to Punt, some Greek islands, perhaps Crete itself, became subjects of the Egyptian pharaoh, whose power even extended to Palestine and Syria. This state of affairs did not last long, since the Egyptians began to be oppressed by other peoples from the north, and rather soon Crete was seized by the ancestors of the Greeks of the classical era, and the Hittites from Asia Minor began to attack Syria. The Cretans, driven out by the Greeks, tried to find another house for themselves, and, despite being defeated at sea by the Egyptians, some of them still managed to settle in southern Palestine. We are known as the Philistines of the Bible.
Fig. 7 Egyptian warship. Around 1200 BC. er
The carved image on which Ramses III, the last great ruler of the Egyptian empire, celebrates his victory over these "northern peoples" in about 1200 BC. e., shows a completely different types of vessels in the two opposing fleets. Egyptian ships (Fig. 7) have almost the same shape as before, but have changed significantly in detail. The stern lost the decoration in the form of a lotus flower and now ended with a thin raised tip, and on the nose in the place where the body ended, there was a lion's head flaunted. Rowers defended falshbort, and at the top of the mast appeared Mars. The last two features, most likely, were characteristic only for warships. The sail also changed: it lost the boom at the bottom and could now get under the yoke, which remained raised.
Northern ships (Fig. 8, p. 22), obviously, clean sailboats. They are the same in the bow and stern - they have relatively straight hulls, the extremities of which curve sharply upwards and are crowned with bird heads as decorations. Their masts and sails are the same as those of the Egyptians, but it should be remembered that they were portrayed by an Egyptian artist who could easily overlook slight differences and draw a familiar rigging.
Fig. eight. Cretan warship. Around 1200 BC. er
The victory over the Cretans was one of the last successes of the Egyptian Empire. For several centuries, Egypt remained an independent state, but ceased to exist as a great world power. Already in the next century, the Philistines, the Jews and the Aramaeans took from him Syria and Palestine. At the same time, the Egyptians, who by their nature were not seafarers, drove the Phoenicians, one of the greatest sea peoples in history, out of the Levant trade.
In general, ships over the two or three previous millennia have not changed much. Egypt, of course, had a highly developed civilization and made a significant contribution to the development of shipbuilding in the early stages, but later Egyptian shipbuilding was at the mercy of stagnation, and other peoples introduced innovations to this process. This began the Cretans, and continued the Phoenicians and their great successors - the Greeks and Romans.
Since ancient times, human settlements have always been located near water. People not only took water from the river, they tried to use it for transport purposes. The beginning of shipping can be attributed to the times when crafts began to develop, the first manufactories appeared.
People began to build the first wooden shuttles to transport crafts, leather, furs, semi-precious stones, wooden and clay utensils. The first ships were rowing, made of wood. The most popular ships in the 9th-14th centuries were rooks, strugs and shitiki.
Rook or in common dubas, was a wooden boat on the oars, equipped with a sail. Initially, such a vessel was hollowed out entirely from a large oak or linden trunk, which was then built up on top with wooden planks. Then the rooks began to build entirely from the boards.
Wooden rook
In ancient Russia, such rowing boats about 25 meters long were called uskuyas.
Struga
The flat-bottomed rowing vessel was equipped with a removable mast that could be removed if desired. In length, such a boat was from 20 to 40 meters, the stern and the bow could be the same size. At the stern there was a small cabin called the attic.
Shitik
Shitik called a small flat-bottomed vessel, parts of which were fastened together with spruce rods or straps. The length of the shitik was 10 meters; such a ship had a small sail sewn from individual skin panels.
Trade relations in the second half of the XIV century
The beginning of shipping was laid in the XIV century, when the development of trade between the countries required large vessels containing a large amount of goods. At this time, the shipyards began to build large flat-bottomed three-masted vessels, which were equipped not only with sails but also with oars.
Three-masted double-deck vessel A little later, three-masted double-decked vessels became widespread, the length of which could be up to 100 meters. A big period in the history of the development of Russian shipping is burlachestvo. The barges, laden with goods, moved along the river at the expense of heavy Burlak labor.
Shipping development
In the middle of the 18th century, the first ships appeared, set in motion by a steam engine. The first steam vessel in Russia was built in the summer of 1915 by the owner of a cast-iron factory, Karl Byrd. The first steamers had an iron hull and large paddle wheels on the sides. In the meantime, Russian industry developed at an intensive pace.
For shipping and passenger traffic, special shipping companies were opened. Steamer machines are constantly improved, steam engines with increased pressure in the boiler were used.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the first ships appeared. The first motor ship "Vandal" was built in 1903 by the Nobel brothers at the Sormovsky plant. These were rather high-speed comfortable steam vessels that were engaged in passenger transportation.
Modern ships are equipped with a diesel engine, which drives the propellers. The hull of such ships is made of steel, titanium and aluminum plates. The wheelhouse of the ship is equipped with navigation devices that do not allow the ship to deviate from the course.
