Sailing ships

by E. Keble Chatterton

Fig. 36. A Fourteenth-Century Dromon.

As to the other ships which Richard had with him besides the Viking type, there were the Mediterranean galleys, somewhat similar to those shown in Figs. 57 and 58. A “dromon” or “dromond” is also mentioned, but this word was used very loosely, as for instance the word “barge” and other examples already given in our own times. Sometimes “dromon” referred to a vessel of large tonnage, but the reader will see in Fig. 36 a much smaller ship bearing the same appellation. This mosaic is taken from the ceiling in St. Mark’s, Venice, and belongs to the year 1359. The incident depicted is that of bringing St. Mark to Alexandria from Egiddo. The rig is lateen and the rake of the mast is about the same as seen in the modern dhow-rigged yacht shown in Fig. 101. In the dromon St. Mark is at the stern sheltered from the following sea by a bulwark that would seem to have been super-added to the hull. Notice, too, that by this time a rudder has been fixed to the ship at the extreme stern, and that it appears to be worked by means of a rope leading in through a hole in the gunwale. Of the crew of two one is holding on to the vang, which comes down from the peak of the sail, a relic, no doubt, of the brace of the squaresail, while the man forward has just hoisted up the sail. Nowadays, that part of the mast seen to project beyond the sail would be cut off in a dhow-rigged vessel, the yard coming flush with the truck of the mast.

There was also in the fleet of Mediterranean craft which joined Richard, a ship of the class called a buss, bucca, or buzzo. This was a Venetian type of merchant ship, bluff-bowed and highly useful as a transport. Levi[47] derives the name, not from the Italian word meaning “stomach,” although she has a hold capable of stowing away much cargo, but from buco meaning a hole or small, dark room, into which the cargo was thrown. The various kinds of galleys are spoken of under the names of gallion, galliot, galleass—though in course of time a different and distinctive meaning has been assigned to each of these words—and the visser was a shallow transport perhaps not differing much from the hippago of the Althiburus mosaic. A “barge” was probably more like one of those tar-covered “coasters” that one sees loading in every port—in hull, that is, but with a square-sail and of course no triangular headsails.[48] Of the Viking class Richard had with him some of the esneccas or “Long Serpent” type as well as some “Cogs.” The latter class was also of Scandinavian origin and probably somewhat bigger than the skuta type. Hakluyt includes a letter sent from our King Henry III. to Haquinus, King of Norway, granting permission to Norwegian merchants to come and go freely into English ports. “Wee will and command all bailifes of Portes,” reads the mandate, “at which the Cog of Norway (wherein certaine of the king of Norwaie his souldiers, and certain Merchants of Saxonie are coming for England) shall touch, that when the fore-said Cog shall chance to arrive at any of their Havens, they doe permit the said Cog safely to remain in their said Havens, &c.” Perhaps she was a new type of Viking ship and, like the “Long Serpent,” gave her name to the class of ships built after her model.

On a MS. in the possession of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, we see a couple of galleys ramming each other with the spur some distance above the waterline. The largest of Richard’s galleys in the Mediterranean had thirty oars, and the Viking type of steering paddle was still used, since the rudder affixed to the farthest end of the stern had not yet been introduced into ships of North Europe. Masts and sails were carried as usual. The larger ships of Richard’s fleet that we have mentioned also carried engines for projecting darts as well as terrible explosives. The banner under which they fought at this time was that of St. George. As to the equipment of this first great English fleet the chief vessels had each three spare steering paddles, thirteen anchors, thirty oars, two sails, three sets of all kinds of ropes, and duplicates of all gear except the mast and boat. There are not wanting plenty of references to the esnecca or “Serpent” class. Thus there is a record of payment “to the men of the esnecca” (Pipe Roll, 5 Henry II., p. 45. Pipe Roll Socy.); “paid out to me of the snecca for the Queen’s passage and that of Henry FitzGerald with the treasure and of Nicholas de Sigillo £30 : 10” (Pipe Roll, 6 Henry III., p. 47); “to the sailors of the snecca twenty shillings by the king’s writ” (Pipe Roll, 8 Henry II., p. 35). The ship that was reserved for carrying royalty across from England to France was always at this period called the “esnecca.”

The resulting effects on England of this crusade were not confined to her naval architecture. Although it was not the first time that a North European or even an Englishman had sailed in the Mediterranean, it was the first instance of a naval expedition on a large scale setting forth from these shores to the Levant. It gave our sailors in a smaller way just that experience which the recent world-cruise of the fleet of the United States from the Atlantic to the Pacific and back again has obtained for American sailormen. It made deep-sea sailors of the men who had only been coasters, and showed them in what directions their ships could be improved upon. But its effect on the trade of England was to expand it, to create new sources of imports and fresh outlets for her exports. England owes a great debt to Richard I., besides, for his attention to maritime legislature. Hakluyt gives a list of the laws the king ordained for his navy during this expedition, as, for instance, that any one who killed another on board ship should be tied to the dead man and thrown overboard: and that if he killed him on land he should in like manner be tied “with the partie slaine, and be buried with him in the earth.” It was from the Levant that Richard brought a roll of laws regulating maritime affairs, and which, being held in high honour on the Southern sea, he ordered to be observed in English waters. Very drastic were these laws of Oleron, framed for the benefit of the merchant service. Thus if a pilot from ignorance or otherwise lost the ship entrusted to his navigation and the merchants thereby sustained damage, the pilot was to make full satisfaction if he had means, and if he lacked these he was to forfeit his head. It is interesting to note the care that was taken to prevent ships fouling each other’s anchors, for it was enacted that all anchors were to be indicated by buoys. But no modern sailor will read without a smile the regulation that if a vessel were wind or weather-bound, the master, when a change in the conditions had occurred, was to consult his crew, saying to them, “Gentlemen, what think you of this wind?” and to be guided as to whether he should put to sea by the opinion of the majority. It is not difficult to imagine what the verdict of such a consultation would be to-day on a big barque, for instance, after the men have returned from their carouse ashore, if the law were still in force. The “gentlemen’s” opinion of the wind would be something unprintable.

During the reign of John, ships reached a size as big as eighty tons. Hakluyt contains a reference to the time when Louis invaded England to aid Archbishop Langton. “Hubert of Borough (then captaine of Dover) following the opinion of Themistocles in the exposition of the oracle of the woodden walls, by the aide of the [Cinque] Port townes, armed fortie tall ships, and meeting with eightie saile of French men upon the high seas, gave them a most couragious encounter, in which he tooke some, sunke others, and discomfitted the rest.” Under John the English navy was considerably improved, and this was the first of our sovereigns to retain seamen with permanent pay. Instead of being alternately pirates, fishermen and fighting men of the state, the sailor became endowed with a higher status. The privileges first granted to the Cinque Ports by Edward the Confessor, William the Conqueror and their successors, did much to assist the progress of the sailing ship; but in addition to the ships supplied to him by these south coast ports, John had also ships of his own. This reign is notable, too, as the first instance of our country claiming to be “The Sovereign of the Seas.”

Nor under Henry III. was this progression in maritime matters arrested. Every year the size of ships was becoming greater. Thanks to the Mediterranean influence they were getting away from the Viking type to a more protected and seaworthy kind. Decks and cabins and more than one mast were introduced, and in 1228 a vessel that was sent to Gascony with the king’s effects had expended on her a certain sum of money “for making a chamber in the said ship to place the king’s things in.” In 1242 there is a direction for the cabins of the king and queen to be wainscotted. The seal of Sandwich, one of the Cinque Ports, of the date of 1238, shows the customary Viking hull, as usual, clinker-built. But some notable additions have been made. Both in the bows and stern a raised structure has been added to enable the men to hurl the same destruction from a height that they had seen the Mediterraneans operate during the Crusade. The space underneath the stern-castle was used as a kind of roofed deck-house or cabin, but open at the sides, and we see one of the barons of Sandwich sitting in a dignified manner under this shelter, while a couple of the crew are aloft on the yard, evidently about to unfurl the sail. At the top of the mast has been placed a fighting-top. A very thick forestay, two backstays, and four shrouds are shown, but possibly the two halyards did duty also as backstays. A small rowing boat is seen carried on board, as well as two more crew.

Fig. 37. Seal of Winchelsea (End of the Thirteenth Century).

Fig. 37 has been sketched from the seal of Winchelsea in the British Museum. For detail of information it is pre-eminent: the date is the end of the thirteenth century. The reader, after making allowances for the limitations of space and shape imposed on the artist, will at once remark the similarity of the lines, especially at bow and stern, between this and the Gogstad ship. The stem- and stern-post are depicted very high. Forward is seen the forecastle taking its Gothic curves from the architecture on shore. Above, floats a flag. Below the stern-castle sits the baron or commander protected by the roof and arches, whilst over him two trumpeters are pealing forth. We have seen this trumpeting at the stern also depicted in the ancient Mediterranean ship coming into harbour (Fig. 22), and the practice was evidently still a common one in the middle ages when entering or leaving port so as to give due warning to approaching vessels. Hakluyt contains a reference to Richard when he had wearied of waiting at Marseilles and had sailed to Messina. “After that he had heard that his ships were arrived at Messana in Sicilie, he made the more speed and so the 23. of September entred Messana with such a noyse of Trumpets and Shalmes, with such a rout and shew, that it was to the great wonderment and terror both of the Frenchmen, and of all other that did heare and behold the sight.”