Ships by Nation or Culture (pre GAOP)

[Jib]

We all know of the Spanish Galleon. But did certain other Nations favor certain ship types? Did the English like a type of Snow, Brig, or Sloop? What did the French build? How about other nations?

[blackjohn]

There are shipbuilding trends by region, sure. England had New England shipbuilders and Jamaican shipbuilders at her disposal. Spain had ships being built in her holdings in the South Sea. The Dutch had the fluyt. Sooner or later, though, if someone sees a good thing, someone somewhere is going to copy it.

[Captain Jim-sib]

Consider also the water depths that the vessels would be using. The Jamacian / Berumda-type sloops would draw 5-6 ft. These colonial vessels were perfect for inland waterways and were stable in deep water. As Blackjohn mentioned, this designed was copied by Virignina & New England shipyards because it was a good design.

Elizabethean galleys modified the Spanish galley by sharpened the bow angle and thinning the stern blow the waterline. This improvement created less drag and was not so box-like as the Spanish. There is a famous period English drawing which shows a fish superimposed on a ship's hull where the designers were attempting to copy nature's streamline design.

[Coastie04]

A lot ships were very similar in basic design, but they did have certain unique aspects based on shipbuilding lineage and geography. One example has already been mentioned about draft. Lots of smaller vessels in the Denmark/Sweeden region have shallow drafting round hulls and sideboards instead of a large keel. This allows them to beach the boat relatively easily, and the sideboards can be retracted in any shallow water or to cross a reef. In the Nova Scotia area, where the large tides and shallow beaches create huge tidal ranges, lots of fishing vessels were flat or round bottomed with a large enough beam so that to unload them, they could just be run up on the beach at high tide, and unloaded strait to a cart at low tide. The British ships were generally beamier with a greater draft. This allowed them to carry much more cargo, and helped them with the rougher seas up north. However, their fastest and most weatherly ships (at least during the 1700s) were either ships captured from the French, or ships built to the same lines (copies).

As for pre-GAoP vessels, don't forget the Viking longboat (great for landing parties, and relatively fast), the Mediteranian galleys (in use by the Spanish into the 1700s), the Chinese junks (a much more advanced rig than Europeans had at the time), the Egyptian reed boats, and the catamarans found in the South Pacific, just to name a few. Then there's the host of small vessels designed for coastal and river use, such as kayaks, canoes (in all their incarnations, such as birch bark, dugout, etc.), bull boats, row boats in Europe, those really skinny dugout canoes used in the Amazon, etc.

Even today, boats are built for their purpose and geography. Ships designed for the Atlantic sometimes perform very poorly in the Pacific because of the differences in the wave lengths and heights. Obviously, ships that operate around ice have reinforced hulls. Buoy tenders (such as the one I'm currently on) are designed to stay in one place with a stable deck. Minesweepers are made out of wood in order to avoid setting off some mines. Due to the geography of Southeast Alaska, the favored personal boat here is an aluminum one with a drop down bow (imagine a WWII landing craft scaled down to 16-25 ft). It's easier to land for hunting, and if your boat's big enough, you can load an ATV or dirt bike and head out to a different island. Hope this helps.

Coastie

[Coastie04]

For even more, and a lot of pictures, go to THIS website. It takes quite a while to load, even with a fast connection, but the pictures and links of replica ships of all time periods and styles is outstanding. Just as a disclaimer, however, the replicas are of a wide range of accuracy. Some are extremely accurate, others are almost comical in appearance, and some are just guesses as to what the ships back then (I'm assuming lots of the medeival ones and especially the older replicas of Roman biremes are not necessarily historical replicas, but then again, they're not my era of expertise). It really is nice to look at the ships from different cultures and how the general styles were really different.

Coastie :angry:

[Captain Jim-sib]

Certainly one can debate the attributes of nations' vessels, yet take it in an ecomonical perspective. The Spanish had circumnavigated the globe several times before Drake in the Pelican / Golden Hind. It is documented that the Spanish got over 200,000 miles per galleon.

[blackjohn]

There's actually a good amount of data on certain types of Roman ships. They've found, as I recall, a few complete river transports.

Speaking of... galleys see use in the Mediterranean very late, probably straight through til the end of the Age of Sail.

[Jib]

Thanks everyone. Doing some research and your helps is wonderful.

[blackjohn]

I just remembered, last year when I was working with the marine archaeologist, we got to talking about this galleon that they think they know the whereabouts of. During this, I was surprised to find the typical Spanish galleon is, you guessed it, pretty much a Hollywood stereotype, according to my friend/boss the trained professional.