A close examination of these reproductions brings out different types of ships. Several of them show us important vessels which, by their great rams, their high castles and their broad sterns, differ notably from the old Holland ship.
Van Yk’s work also shows, on page 9, a reproduction of those big vessels which the author calls Spanish “Caracks” or galleons, two types of ships which arose under the influence of the Mediterranean.
But, alongside of these “caracks” are also found smaller Dutch vessels. An engraving of 1564, of a Breugel picture, shows particularly an Amsterdam merchantman. It has a round stern. It can be compared advantageously with an old Flemish engraving, dating from 1480 or 1490, which shows a “Kraeck” without escutcheon, and of which the castles differ completely in form and size from those carried by the ships seen in the engravings of Maître W. A. These castles agree with the Mediterranean types.
The boat with the square stern had been adopted in Holland, therefore, as far back as the end of the XVIth century.
Square sterns remained in use there, for large vessels up to the end of the XVIIIth century; at that time a return was made to the old structure, in imitation of England which used the square stern for only a short time, seeing that William Pitt (HOLMES, p. 40) introduced the rounded forms there in the XVIIth century. Hence Mr. de Jonge is in error when he says in his work that the vessel with the square stern only appeared in Holland in 1651.
The adoption of the square stern, nevertheless, did not cause the old round-stern, full-bow vessel to disappear; this is an established fact.
Another word about ports. The old reproductions of the XVIth century show ports; some are even found on a miniature of 1428. In any event, their general use dates back to the end of the XVth century; they seem to have been invented by a Frenchman from Brest, named Descharges. (DE JONGE, Vol. I, p. 85.)
The masts and rigging also underwent important changes. At the beginning of the Eighty Years War (1590), an inhabitant of Enkhuizen, “Kryn Wouterez” by name, according to Brandt (History of Enkhuizen, Vol. I, p. 139), invented a process for making masts in several sections (DE JONGE, Vol. I, p. 390). The masts, made first of two pieces, were, by means of this new invention, soon made in three parts each carrying a square sail. From this time, the old medieval rig of one large sail begins to disappear.
In order to facilitate the evolutions of the ship, a square sail was placed on the bowsprit.