As the result of this constant increase of the width of the sail, the rigging became more complicated and a top was placed at the head of the mast in order to handle the lines from there.
The scarceness of wood in Egypt was the cause, from the most distant times, of recourse being had to other materials for the construction of vessels. Papyrus answered this purpose very well. This aquatic plant when cut, dried and made up in bundles, formed the material of which the boats were made.
The papyri were laid side by side and a whole was made of them by ties placed at close intervals. (ERMANN, p. 593; NICOLAS WITSEN, p. 6; Archéologie navale, by A. JAL, Vol. I, p. 91.)
Several drawings found on old monuments show us the Egyptians engaged in this work.
The papyrus barks formed a sort of rafts of reeds, judging by these drawings which represent the oarsmen standing upright on the boats.
These latter were small; attempts made later to build them of larger size appear to have failed. As a general rule, the wood intended for the construction of the larger vessels had to be imported.
The many pictures on monuments and the large number of models found, enable a very fair idea of the shape of the ancient Egyptian ship to be formed, and it can be seen at the same time that these shapes were little changed.
Before describing these models, it will be rather interesting to note that, as a general rule, the oldest ones are not reproduced in accordance with the proportions adopted in practice; they are too high and too broad for the length. Taken by themselves, the stem and the sternpost are well shown, but the intermediate body is too short. The cause of this must be sought in the fact that these models are made from nature and not by taking the dimensions of the boats from carefully prepared drawings. Proceeding in this way, it is very difficult to give exactly the relative dimensions of the boats, especially in the relations between length and breadth. This is why the vessels are drawn so often with too little length. So, many old models must be accepted with the necessary reserves.