History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce, Volume 1 (of 4)

by W. S. Lindsay

Mr. Howell, a comparatively modern writer,[395] adopts many of the views of Vossius, but differs from him in that he maintains that it would be impossible to work with effect more than five banks of oars. As his views are more in accordance with our own than those of any other writer, we shall refer to them at greater length, although differing also from him in some of his most important conclusions. And here it ought to be stated, that all modern writers, Mr. Howell included, appear to have given too little consideration to the facts, that ancient galleys varied quite as much in size as the vessels of modern times, that their power or dimensions were not, in all cases, measured by the number of their banks of oars, and that in proportion to the number of rowers the capacity of the hold would require to be increased. A war-galley would be comparatively useless if she had not ample capacity for fighting men, and for their munitions of every kind, besides stores, including water. All these points must, however, have been fully considered by the ancients, who evidently saw, when they wished to have more than thirty oars on each side of a galley, that an increase could not be obtained on the single-bank principle without constructing her of an unwieldy length in proportion to her depth and breadth, and thus sacrificing an unnecessarily large amount of space. Consequently, they invented the bireme, whereby they could, in little more than the length required for fifteen oars, place double that number without any corresponding sacrifice of space; while in the trireme, they would in nearly the same length obtain space for three times the number of oars, and secure for the use of the soldiers and stores ample accommodation and any extra length they might desire.

Mr. Howell, in discussing this principle as applicable to quinqueremes, shows that, by adopting the oblique ascent, the rowers of the first and highest bank can be placed so as not to interfere with the rowers on the second, their oars having space to play free of the benches before them. “That a bank or bench of oars,” he adds, “never contained more than five oars, I think, can be proved, whatever the size of the galley was, whether a bireme or trireme, up to the galley of Philopator, which had forty banks, nine feet being the highest point from the water for the scalmi, from which they could pull with effect.”[396]

Mr. Howell, in confirmation, as he conceives, of this opinion, quotes Athenæus;[397] but, though there is nothing in the description of the great ship to lead to the conclusion that the scalmi of her highest bank of oars were only nine feet above the level of the water, we agree with Mr. Howell that an oar could not be worked effectively at a greater height, and that the seats of the rowers were arranged by the system of obliquity, so as not to interfere with each other. We, however, differ from him in other respects. “A Greek trireme,” he remarks, “at the time of the invasion of Xerxes, had from one hundred and fifty to one hundred and sixty rowers and forty armed foot, while the average-sized Persian triremes carried two hundred rowers and thirty soldiers.” Presuming these to be established facts, Mr. Howell endeavours to make his theory harmonize with them. “I have shown,” he says, referring to the French vessel, of which we have furnished particulars, “that a modern galley pulling fifty oars has six rowers on a bench. If I am correct,” he continues, “a trireme pulled thirty oars, that is, three banks, five oars in each, thus:—

Now, to a vessel of her bulk, with elevated poop and stern,” he goes on to state, “less than five men cannot be allowed to each seat. Thus there are twenty-five rowers in each bank, and six times twenty-five make one hundred and fifty.” But though this mode of calculation (which, by the way, does not allow for any “watch-and-watch” or reliefs[398]) makes the Grecian galley agree with his scheme of manning her so far as regards the number of rowers, it is based upon the presumption that every oar had the same number of men. But this could not have been the case; for even if five men could be placed to advantage on each of the upper tiers of oars, two of them, at least, would be useless on the lower tiers of a vessel of this size, as they would not have space to work at it. The same fallacy runs throughout his arguments in other places. Thus he accounts for the Persian trireme with her two hundred men, by saying that she “must have had six men to an oar, which is not improbable, the Asiatics being not so athletic as the Greeks. Six times thirty,” he adds, “is one hundred and eighty, leaving twenty men for casualties, etc., etc.”

This is an exceedingly easy mode of attempting to solve an intricate question; but Mr. Howell, instead of overcoming the difficulty, only increases it when he says that there must have been six men to an oar, for six men would be less easily placed at each of the lower tiers of oars than five. Nor does he aid in the solution of this vexed problem when he comes to deal with vessels of five banks. Practically his arguments are the same, and show the mistakes which learned men are liable to make when dealing with questions requiring experience as well as learning. “Polybius,” remarks Mr. Howell, “informs us the crew of a quinquereme was three hundred rowers, and one hundred and twenty fighting men. Now a quinquereme,” he reasons, “having five banks, thus—

pulled fifty oars, or twenty-five aside, the same number as the modern galley. As by this arrangement, adding to the banks of the galley,” he continues, “did not add to her height, and not in any great degree to her length, seven feet being sufficient for a bank, I think the addition of one man to an oar was all she could require. Six times five is thirty, and ten times thirty, three hundred. Both of these,” he concludes, by saying with evident self-satisfaction, “are remarkable coincidences, and tally better with the description of ancient authors than any solution that has yet been given.”

“I shall now,” he continues, “show how remarkably it agrees with Athenæus; thus taking in the whole range and applying to all, a thing it could never do were it not near the truth. The tesseracontoros having,” he adds, “forty banks, five oars to a bench, makes her have two hundred oars of a side, or four hundred in all. Considering her size, she could not have less than ten men to an oar.” The Liburnia of Caligula, according to the testimony of Suetonius, had, he states, that number of men to an oar, forgetting that she was a single-banked galley, and consequently he concludes that that number was attached to each of the four hundred oars in Philopator’s ship, which “gives four thousand, the number mentioned by Athenæus.” Here again he overlooks the impracticability of placing ten men at each of the lower tier of oars.

Our own views.