Ships and Seamen in the Author(s): John H. Parry Source: Caribbean Quarterly, Vol. 2, No. 1 (1951/1952), pp. 25-33 Published by: University of the West Indies and Caribbean Quarterly Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40652493 . Accessed: 20/05/2013 12:39

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions and Seamen in the Age of Discovery

John H. Parry, Professorof Historyin the UniversityCollege of the West Indies

One of the outstandingcharacteristics of Westerncivilization is its preoccupation with technicalproblems and its masteryof a wide range of mechanical devices. Technical skill and the ability to turn theoreticalknowledge to practical material ends have been major factorsin the extensionof European influenceround the world,and have forcibly,though not always favourably,impressed all the peoples with whom Europeans came into contact. Clearly one of the most important branchesof technicalability from the point of view of discoveryand expansion is the abilityto build and handle ships. In particularthe date, the method and the speed of settlementin the Americaswere determinedby the natureof the shipping available forthe purpose. Columbussailed to Americain 1492 withthree ships and ninetymen. In the years followinghis discoveryhundreds of ships and thousands of people crossedfrom Europe. Quite apart fromany question of Columbus's own knowledgeor determination,these events could not have taken place if therehad not been appropriateships forthe purpose. America mightconceivably, by some flukeof or fortune,have become known to Europeans in the thirteenthor fourteenthcentury. There was no lack of brave seamen and no lack of knowledge thatthe worldwas round; and the Norsemen,we know, had reachedNorth America long beforeColumbus, probably by way of Iceland and Greenland.But if by some chance America had been "discovered" in 1292 or 1392, it could not have been conqueredor settledby Europeans, because the ships of that time were not equal to regularvoyages across the Atlantic.The fifteenthand sixteenthcenturies were a periodof rapid developmentin design. This is an aspect of the historyof the Age of Discoverywhich is oftenoverlooked in the text books, but which is vitally important. The shippingof WesternEurope in the Middle Ages grewfrom two main stems, the one Mediterranean,the other Atlantic. The Celtic and Scandinavian coast- dwellersof NorthernEurope, very early in theirrecorded history, developed open ships or boats designedfor , but fittedwith thwartsand tholes for rowing when the wind was wrong. The long-shipsof the Norsemen, of which several examples survive,must have been capable of withstandingconsiderable seas, and the same is probablytrue of the early ships of other North European peoples, of which much less is known. They were sailing ships built for ocean use. The Mediterraneanpeoples, on the other hand, at a far earlier date developed a type of ship- the - primarilydesigned for rowing, but capable of proceedingunder whenthe wind was right. A great deal of fifteenthcentury trade was carried in galleys. In the Mediterraneanthey were preferredfor their speed and reliabilityand for their independenceof the wind. Galleyswon thebattle of Lepanto. They did not disappear altogetheruntil the eighteenthcentury. But they were obviously unsuitable for

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions explorationor for any kind of deep sea work. There is no analogy betweensteam propulsionand oar propulsion.The provisionof steam power greatlyreduced the numbersof the crewneeded to handle a ship; the provisionof oars greatlyincreased the numbers,and the accommodationof the oarsmenand the storesneeded to feed them occupied valuable space and reduced the operatingrange of the ship. Also thegalley's designwas unsuitablefor the open sea. Its greatbanks of oars demanded greatlength in proportionto beam and freeboard; and in wooden constructionthis made the ship too whippyto meethead seas withsafety. The contributionof galleys to the expansionof Europe was very small. The otherstream of shipbuildingdevelopment, descending from the boats of the Scandinavian fishermenand raiders, had produced by the fourteenthcentury a distinctivetype of which used oars only in emergency,if at all, and which was common, with minor local variations, to all the Atlantic coasts of Europe. Much of our knowledgeof these late mediaeval ships is derived fromthe municipal seals of the ports of Western Europe, which often included ships in theirdesign; but thereare some writtenrecords too. In England, in particular,the compositionof the Navy is known from time to time fromlists of ships either owned, charteredor requisitionedby the King. Perhaps the most surprisingthing about some of these ships is theirsize. The steadyincrease in seabornetrade in the laterMiddle Ages had createda need forlarger ships. Ships of two or threehundred tons were not uncommon,and some of the biggestclass, the carrackswhich plied betwen the Italian cities and the ports of NorthernEurope, were as big as six hundredtons by theyear 1400. But one mustaccept all tonnagefigures with caution. Up to the seventeenthcentury a ship's tonnagemeant the numberof tuns of wine whichit could carryin cask. The tun was an internationallyaccepted measureand in most parts of Europe was about forty-two cubic feet of liquid; but casks are awkwardlyshaped objects forclose stowage.A tun of wine in cask in a ship's hold probablyoccupied somethinglike sixtycubic feetof hold space, and even so there must have been a good deal of waste space. The capacity ton used nowadays in measuringships is one hundredfeet of permanentlyenclosed space. Engine room space and the livingspace of the ship's companyis deductedfrom the gross figure in order to obtain the net or registertonnage. Permanentlyenclosed space is differentlydefined in differentcountries; its capacity is calculated from the dimensionsof the ship by an arbitraryformula, so that shape as well as size is a factorin a ship's tonnage.The registertonnage of a ship is thus by no means a certainguide to its actual size. Warshipsare not measuredin capacity tons at all, but by displacement.None of these modern methods of measurementbear any fixedrelation either to one anotheror to the old wine tun. Except in the few cases when actual dimensionsare recorded,we have no certainguide to the size of any ship beforethe seventeenthcentury. On the whole, it is probable that the ships of our period were considerablysmaller than theirrecorded tonnage figuressuggest. The European ship of 1400 was very beamy. There was no method of longitudinalbracing and the principalstiffening of the hull was the singletree trunk whichusually formed the . Every increasein size, therefore,involved an increase in the proportionof beam to length in order to prevent the hull becoming dangerouslywhippy. In large ships, the usual proportionwas threeto one, taking the extremeoverall length.The proportionof lengthof keel to overall lengthwas small,less than one half. The hull ratherresembled an elongatedsaucer; this shape,

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions whileobviously not conduciveto weatherlysailing qualities, did make for stability. Ships so designed probably needed very little ballast, and their topsides could safelybe built up to a considerableheight. This was a very importantfactor in time of war, since the sea fightingof the time was mainly a matterof grappling and boarding. Additionalheight was given by fittingraised castles fore and aft for accommodatingcrossbowmen and the light artilleryof the time. These castles in the middle Ages had usually been temporarystructures, since there was as yet no clear distinctionbetween warships and merchantment.Shipbuilding towns often had guilds of castle-wrights,specialised craftsmenwhose trade was to convert requisitionedmerchant ships into men of war by fittingthem with castles. Already by 1400, however, the practice was growingof building a permanentlyraised foVsle and poop as part of the structureof big ships, a practicecarried to excess in the great ships of the sixteenthcentury. A few otherodd details of hull design are worthmentioning. By 1400 big European ships were fully decked. Many of themwere -built- that is, with the strakesof the hull fittedflush instead of overlapping.Most of themwere steeredby a rudderslung on the sternpost instead of by an oar over the stern,as in earlier times. Copper sheathingwas unknown; barnaclesand boringwere discouragedby coatingthe hull with tallow. European ships of about 1400 were almost all square-rigged.The main characteristicof , of course, is thatwhile it is ideal forrunning before the wind, it is useless with the wind beforethe beam. This generalizationapplies only to pure square rig; the so-called square-riggedwindjammer of more modern times was fittedwith fore - and aft-sailsfor beatingto windward,in additionto its main suit of square . But fore- and aft-rigdid not come into general use until the eighteenthcentury, and our fifteenthcentury ship had no such refinements.The limitationsof its rig were emphasizedby the lines of its hull; unless the wind were asternor nearly so, the ship tended to make enormousleeway, and a head wind kept it in harbour. Square rig has one particularlyimportant advantage; it enables the total sail area of a ship to be divided into a large numberof units,each of a size which can be easily handled. A square-riggedship, therefore,can carry a bigger total area of canvas than any othertype. Square rig is, in fact, the only really satisfactory rig forbig ships. The ship designersof WesternEurope stuckto square rig through- out the whole historyof deep watersailing ships for this reason. Handier and more efficienttypes of sail were introducedfrom the fifteenthcentury onwards, and, as we shall see, they improvedthe sailing qualities of ships enormously;but though they supplementedthe traditionalsquare sail, they never ousted it. It was by successivecombination of square sails with other types that ship builders of the Atlanticports were able to achieve the peak of sailing ship perfectionin the China of the last century.But that is looking far ahead. In the year 1400 the principleof breakingup a ship's canvas area forease of handlingwas in its infancy. A few big ships had two or even threemasts, but most had only one. Each carried a single square sail, laced to an enormousyard. The masts were single poles; separate topmastshad not been invented.Topsails, in later years the main drivingsails of all big ships, were introducedabout 1400, and at firstwere of pocket-handkerchiefsizle. Recently introducedalso was the practice of sending men aloftto furlthe sail on the , instead of loweringthe yard on to the gun- wales in harbouror in bad weatherat sea.

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions In general, the sailing ship of WesternEurope, thoughit had attained con- siderablesize by 1400, was still a clumsyand primitiveaffair. It could carrylarge numbersof men and a bulky cargo for comparativelyshort passages with a fair wind, and that was all. It was wholly unsuitablefor the business of exploration, for followingthe windings of strange coasts, exploring estuaries, meeting the dangersof shoals, lee shoresand headwinds.In devisingcraft suitable for voyages of discoveryand long distancetrade, European marinershad to borrowand adapt non-Europeandesigns. The chief innovatorsin this matterwere the Portuguese. The designswhich they borrowed, in shippingas in many otherbranches of research, were Asiatic; to be exact, Arab. At the same time that Europeans were first beginningto thinkof reachingthe East by sea, most of the deep sea trade of the Indian Ocean from Malacca to Ormuz and Suez was being carried in ships of Arab type- the ships compendiouslydescribed by Europeans as . is not an Arabic word, and its use by Europeans covers a considerablevariety of MiddleEastern craftof all sizes. The word is used here to describethe characteristic deep water sailing ship of the Indian Ocean which is called by Arab sailors a ba ghia. Baghla means a mule, in otherwords a generalcarrier. This generalcargo carrier of the Middle East is worth describingin detail, partly because of its interestingdesign and rig, partly because it has exercised a very great indirect influenceon the developmentof sailing craft all over the world. Apart fromits richlycarved transomstern, which was probably imitatedfrom European ships, it has changedvery little since the day when it was firstencountered by Europeans. The Arab dhow is a stoutlybuilt wooden ship, varyingconsiderably in size, but not oftenexceeding two hundredtons. It has a deep keel, a long bow, and a continuoussheer from the bow to the break of the poop. There is no raisedfoVsle, but a raisedpoop and a hightransom stern which is oftenvery elaborately decorated. The hull is fastenedwith iron nails and caulked withcoconut fibre. The nails are a European innovation.Iron can be used because the ships are built of teak, which preservesiron, unlike oak which corrodesit. It is probable that beforethe arrival of Europeans in the East, the plankingof Arab ships was sewn, not nailed to a frame.In some big dhows thereis a double bottom,the space being filledwith a mixtureof lime and crushedcoral whichsets as a hard cement.The dhow therefore can standa good deal ofknocking about, and is as watertightas a woodenship can be. The dhow usually has two masts with a pronouncedforward rake. Each mast carriesa singlelateen sail; thatis, a triangular,or nearlytriangular sail, the leading edge of whichis laced to a long yard, hoistedobliquely to the mast. The heel of the yard is securedto the deck, usually amidships.The sail is the special con- tributionof the Arabs to the historyof the world's shipping.It is as characteristic of Islam as the crescentitself. It is also an extremelyefficient general purpose rig; a lateen riggedship sails best when reachingwith the wind on the beam; but it also performswell whenclose hauled. The qualitiesof any sail whenbeating to windward depend largely on its having the luff-the leading edge- as long and as taut as possible. These qualities are supplied in the lateen sail by the long yard. Lateen rig is least efficientwhen runningbefore the wind, as one would expect, on account of the dangerof gybing.In this point of sailingit is inferiorto square rig; but the disadvantagecan be overcometo some extentby sailing goose-winged. By simple adjustmentsof the tack-tackleand the halliard, the set of the sail can indeed be alteredto suit almostany windconditions. 28

This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Europeans are oftenprejudiced against the dhows by the slovenlyloose-ropes'- end seamanshipof the modern Arab sailor. For all that, the dhows are handy, reliableand extremelyseaworthy craft. They can keep the sea in almostany weather, and in a fair wind can log a steady nine or ten knots,which is fasterthan many steamships.At the beginningof the fifteenthcentury, the dhows were probably the most efficientships in the world, certainlyfar betterdesigned than any con- temporaryships in WesternEurope. It is not surprisingthat when European seamen took to making long ocean voyages, they adopted in their ships many features derived from the dhows, in particular, their rig; but before followingup this developmentwe mustnotice one or two seriousdisadvantages of the lateen rig from an Atlanticpoint of view. The firstdisadvantage is the difficultyof going about. Obviouslyif the sail is to draw properly,the yard must be hoistedon the lee side of the mast, and when the ship goes about, the yard must somehowbe got on to the other side. At sea this can only be done by carryingthe yard over the mast-head,which is a tricky and complicatedmanoeuvre. The Arab sailor never goes about if he can help it. When he is compelledto tack, he prefersto wear round with the wind astern, so as to take advantage of the natural lift of the sail in shiftingthe yard over the mast-head.In the Indian Ocean thisis nota seriousdisadvantage, since the monsoons are regular and predictable. By choosing the right time of the monsoons the dhow-mastercan sail fromthe Red Sea or the Persian Gulf and back again withouta singlemajor alterationof course, and withthe wind on the beam all the not so way. In the variable wind conditionsof the Atlantic,however, things are has remained simple,and tackingis moreoften necessary. Therefore, while the Arab contentwith lateen rig to this day, the European sailor adopted lateen rig in the and fifteenthcentury as an improvement,but was never fully satisfiedwith it, does of eventuallydevised somethingeven betterto replace it. That not, course, detractfrom the debt which European shippingowed to Arab ideas. - The second disadvantage I have already mentioned namely, the relative a third inefficiencyof lateen rig with the wind dead astern.There is disadvantage which is more fundamental:the size and weightof the spars. The design of the lateen sail is such that only one sail can be carriedon each mast. The sails must them. The thereforebe large ones, and very long spars are needed to carry length overall of a of the main yard of a dhow is usuallyabout the same as the length ship. It is made of two or threelengths of teak, fishedtogether, and is naturallyvery the united effortsof the heavy and awkwardto handle. Hoistingthe yard requires thereis a limitto whole crew,with a good deal of singingand shouting.Obviously limitsthe size of the the size of spar whichcan be handled,and thisfactor also ship. fortheir are small Lateen riggedships, therefore,while efficient size, necessarily by standards. European but The Arab dhow is, and always has been, confinedto the Indian Ocean, Mediterranean the Muslim smallerlateen typeswere introducedinto the Eastern by last of the Muslim invaders,particularly the Turks, who duringthe century onslaught of the sea in the Levant. The on the ByzantineEmpire achieved completemastery of the races in the Portuguese,who were the most adventurous European sea-faring lateen in the course of constant fifteenthcentury, became familiarwith these types Whateverthe exact connectinglinks, it is fightingwith the North AfricanMoors. were for certainthat in the early fifteenthcentury, the Portuguese using, coasting

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions and exploringvoyages, a vessel known as a , whichdiffered fundamentally fromthe square-riggedship of the rest of WesternEurope, and whichbetrayed its Asiaticorigin in everyline. Instead of castle structures,built up foreand aft,it had thelow bow, the continuoussheer, and thelong poop of the dhow. It had a narrower and proportionatelylonger hull than most European ships, and was lateen rigged throughout.This was the type of ship in which Henry the Navigator's captains made most of theirvoyages. Unlike its parentthe dhow, however,the caravel did not remaina constanttype. It developedsteadily through the centuryas long-range exploringvoyages revealedits defects. In the firstplace, the difficultyof goingabout was overcomeby shorteningthe yards, by settingthem more nearly upright,and fittingthem more snugly to the mast by means of parráis. This made it unnecessaryto carry the yard over the mast-headwhen going about, the yard being kept always on the same side of the mast, as it is in all modernMediterranean lateen boats. The loss of sail area caused by thesechanges was compensatedby fittinga mizzenmast, thus givingthe caravel threemasts instead of (as in the case of all dhows) two. The numberof masts could not be increasedindefinitely, however, and as the to find Portuguesecaptains venturedfurther and furtherfrom home, they began theircaravels too small forthe long voyages they had to make and the storesthey increasedin had to carry.We have seen that a purelylateen riggedship cannot be Arabs never size beyond a certainpoint withoutloss of efficiency,and that the founda solutionto this problem.Towards the end of the fifteenthcentury the ship- of buildersof Portugaland Spain did finda solutionby combiningthe advantages in one vessel. This vessel was European square rig with those of the Asiatic lateen of the caravela redonda, the square-riggedcaravel, employed in most voyages It carried discoveryin the late fifteenthand early sixteenthcenturies. usually square sails on the foremast,which was riggedwith course and topsail. It retainedlateen and lateen sails varied to rig on mainmastand mizzen. The distributionof square some extent; sometimesthere were four masts, two of which were square-rigged. the lateen when The square-riggedcaravel retainedall the advantagesof pure sailing when close hauled, and its greaterspread of canvas made it much faster running. the windwas dead astern,the lateen The dangerof gybingwas removed,since when alone. Since it carried sails could be furled,leaving the ship to sail undersquare sails numberof masts, the itselfcould a much biggersail area in proportionto the ship be built much bigger. first The introductionof thesquare-rigged caravel was an eventof the importance was the and precursor in the historyof European shipping.Its compositerig parent in the centuriesthat followed.The com- of the rigsof all successfulEuropean ships efficientthat it was extendedfrom light binationof square and lateen sails provedso and seventeenth vessels of the caravel type to big ships, and in the sixteenth one or more lateen sails. It was only in centuriesnearly all ships were fittedwith idea of the great area the eighteenthcentury that designershit on the breakingup aft-sailswith which we of the lateen sail into the much more convenientfore-and are familiartoday. lateen in all classes of vessels The practice of fittinga mixed square and rig of While the earlyvoyages made possiblea change in the nature exploringvoyages. carriedout one or two small , later in our period were reconnaissances by 30

This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions voyages were made by powerfulfleets containing both ships and caravels, the two typesbeing now able to sail in companyin all weathers. To take a few examples; the fleetwith which Columbus discoveredAmerica consistedof threevessels. The flagshipSanta Maria was a square-riggedship with bluffbows and high castle structuresfore and aft, but fittedwith a lateen mizzen; the was a square-riggedcaravel, probablyof the type I have been describing. The thirdvessel, Niña, was a lateen caravel; but on the firstlap of the voyage, Columbus decided that she was under-canvassed,and on puttinginto harbour in the Canary Islands he had her rig changed to that of a square-riggedcaravel. It is clear fromhis journalthat the Admiraldisliked the Santa Maria, and foundher too big and clumsyfor dodgingamong the islands of the Caribbean. Niña under her new rig was his favourite,and he took her out to Amerca again in subsequent expeditions.She seemsto have been the kind of ship thatsailors fall in love with. In the long voyages to India big ships played a much more prominentpart. BartholomewDias made his discovereyof theCape of Good Hope in lateencaravels; but the fleetswith which .and his successorsfollowed up the discovery and reachedIndia werebig fleetscomprising square-rigged caravels and ships. These fleetswere intendedfor trade and, if necessary,conquest as well as exploration. Probablythe caravels were storedfrom the ships, just as destroyersare storedand fuelledat sea today. The caravels also about this time- about 1500- began to be employedas escortsfor the largerunits. When therewas fightingto be done, the caravelswith their greater manoeuvrability were called upon to do it, and the naval battles of the Portugueserevealed the square-riggedcaravel as by far the best fightingship afloat,the fore-runnerof the .The Englishships whichdefeated the Armada in 1588 were largerand more developeddescendants of the caravels of the Columbus' day, and that action remainsto our own day the classic example of superiorityof fire-powerand speed overmere size and weight. This bringsus to thequestion of armament.Sea-fighting in the laterMiddle Ages was chieflya matterof laying alongside and boarding. Galleys, which were pre- fittedwith but it ventedby theiroars fromlaying alongside, were sometimes rams, for is unlikelythat they ever did much damage with them. Sailing ships designed the of fightingwere built up foreand aft to give theirboarding parties advantage of cabin accommodation height.This top-hamperproved so convenientfor purposes thatit remaineda distinctivefeature of mostbig ships,long afterthe originalreason fittednear forit had disappeared.In the same way fightingtops or platformswere the mastheads to accommodatecrossbowmen and arquebusiers. These tops also look-outs. outlivedtheir fighting purpose and later servedto accommodatemasthead In the fifteenthcentury in all big warshipsthe castlesand fightingtops were manned were a distinctfrom the by soldiers,who were carriedfor fightingand who body sailorswho workedthe ship. It is difficultto say who firstintroduced ship-borne artillery and when. Probably theVenetians first used it about themiddle of the fourteenthcentury in theirincessant carried small quarrelswith the Genoese. By 1400 most big European ships guns, and aft. were intendedto pieces mountedin the castle structuresfore They supple- mentcrossbow and musketfire in rakingthe enemy's upper deck. The Portuguese, seemedto have the leadersof all Europe in nauticalmatters in the fifteenthcentury, soldieras the main been thefirst people to recognizethe gun and not the foot weapon in ,and to use guns against the enemy's ships ratherthan against 31

This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions his men. Since theircaravels had no raised castles or fightingtops, they mounted theirguns along the deck firingover the gunwale. About 1500 a French marine engineerhit upon the revolutionaryidea of mountingguns between decks, and piercingthe ship's side withports. At firstthese ports were small roundholes allowing no traversefor the guns, so that all firehad to be point blank. But in the course of the sixteenthcentury they developed into big square ports with hinged scuttles which could be secured against the sea in bad weather,and the guns themselves were fittedwith wedges forpurposes of elevationand tackles for training.To the Englishbelongs the creditof the importantdiscovery that a gun barrelcan be cast and boredin one piece, insteadof beingmade in two halves, bound togetherby iron hoops. This made it possibleto fitmuch largerguns, guns capable of sinkingships at a rangeof halfa mile or more,so heavy that theyhad to be mountedon wheeled carriages,and far too heavy for the castle structuresof old-fashionedships. These heavy guns had to be mountedbetween decks. They were so large and so numerous that they leftlittle room for cargo, and so the warshipdeveloped as a specialised floatingbattery distinct from the cargo-carryingmerchant ship. The gunneryused in the greatArmada battlewas not, therefore,very differentfrom that at Trafalgar. The idea in both battleswas to sink the enemy's ships by firingbroadsides at their hulls, instead of capturingthem by boarding. The developmentof broadside firein the sixteenthcentury had an important effectnot only on naval tactics,but also on ship construction.The mountingof large numbersof guns along the ships' side obviouslyincreased topweight,and caused the ships' timbersto strainoutwards. Builders sought to counteractthese tendencies a characteristic by introducingthe "tumble-home"of the ships' sides, whichis such featureof wooden warshipsfrom the sixteenthcentury onwards. In extremecases, half the especiallyin big Spanish ships,the widthof the upper deck was only ship's waterlinewidth. This devicewas uglyand inconvenient,but necessary.It accentuated and merchant thegrowing distinction in the sixtenthcentury between warships ships, and had a considerableeffect upon naval tactics,since when two such warshipslay was alongsideone another,their gunwales were so far apart that boarding extremely difficult.But that is looking ahead; ships of this type took no part in the great voyagesof discovery. but we We know comparativelylittle about life on board ship in our period, have detailedlists of the men and the storescarried in Columbus' ships, and from themwe can deduce a good deal. Enough has been said to make it clear thatSpanish were not the tubs and Portuguesecaravels were stout,handy and seaworthy.They been or cockle-shellsof popular history.They must, nevertheless,have extremely the cabins uncomfortable.There was no provisionfor sleeping accommodation except there forthe seniorofficers aft. The fo'c'sle space was filledwith cables and gear; were no hammocks-these were an inventionof the AmericanIndians, thankfully on the deck or the hatch adopted by European sailors. The ship's company slept That must have been covers,as best they could, and in bad weatherdown below. and cockroaches,all wooden ships leak to singularlyunpleasant; apart fromrats a routinefor the some extent,and pumpingout seems to have been daily morning watchmen.In bad weatherthere was probablyno dry space in the ship. Cooking of whichwas filledwith was carriedout in an open fire-boxin the bows, the bottom Food consisted sand* on the sand a wood firewas built when the weatherallowed. biscuit. Water in of the familiarsalt beef and pork, beans, chick peas and ship's

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This content downloaded from 148.206.40.98 on Mon, 20 May 2013 12:39:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions cask goes foul very quickly, and in consequence large quantities of wine were carried,the normaldaily allowance per man being about threepints. The idea of carryingfruit as an anti-scorbuticwas then unknown,and all ship's companieson long voyages sufferedmore or less fromscurvy. It was no uncommonthing to lose two-thirdsof a ship's companyon a long voyage. Columbuswas fortunate.Magellan sailed withtwo hundredmen of whom twenty-fivesurvived. Columbus' fleeton the firstvoyage carriedninety men, of whom perhaps forty sailed in the Santa Maria. Consideringthat she was not muchbigger than a Brixham trawler,this was overcrowdingby modern standards. But since she carried no soldiers,she was much less overcrowdedthan the warshipsof the time. The ship's companyseemed to have workedin two watches,the hours of the watches being much the same as now. The masterand the pilot were the two officersin chargeof the two watches. It must be rememberedthat ships oftencarried a sailing-master who workedthe ship, and a pilot who navigated her, as well as the captain who commanded her. The captain was not necessarilya professionalseaman; in a man-of-warhe was more oftena soldier.It was onlywith the developmentof naval gunnerythat soldierswere ousted fromsea-going command in regularmen-of-war. Sailors, beforethat time, were a disreputablelot, prone to piracy, socially little regarded,and in generalunsuited for responsiblecommand. The needs of explorationand sea-borneexpansion, however,made clear the necessityof a body of fightingseamen, who were not just soldiersor merchants affoat,nor just' handlersof ships, but somethingof all three. In exploring,as in and in fighting,it was not only the ships which counted,it was the men in them; the crowded conditionsof small ships on long voyages there was no room for differencesof functionbased on landsmen's ideas. When Drake proclaimedthat - "I must have gentlemenwho went to sea with him must learn to become sailors - the birth the gentlemanto hale and draw with the mariner" he was announcing of a new and honourableprofession, a professionpossessing not only high traditions and of courageand discipline,but also a greatbody of accurateknowledge specialised ennobledwhat had skill. Voyagingto the Indies or the Golden Chersoneseindeed been a somewhatdisreputable calling, as Drake's Queen showedwhen she knighted this himon the quarter-deckof his own flagship.It was thefailure to make important of social change, as much as the failureto keep pace with the development ship and maritime design, which broughtabout the decline of Spanish Portuguese power in the late sixteenthcentury. It was the abilityto make the change which,in part the and at least, made possible the spectacularrise of the sea power of English the Dutch.

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