^ now we're talking.. you can send me some bottles of Napa wine, and i'll finally find out the truth about .. everything
OT from here regarding any new WWW (how fitting with
www.google ..
) riddle
@Aktungbby:
I remember our pms.. i think i asked what you made of this frieze scene and the stern protrusions but we did not discuss this further. Those ships did not stay in the water for long, it seems they were usually pulled out on land, and of course for months during the winter storms. They had stone sheds for their ships for protection, in almost all harbours.
We do not know much about the building details, whether they used planks (i think so, derived from the dugout canoes being used all around the cyclades = northern greek islands roughly formed like a ring or cycle, on a map) and later adding more freeboard via planks, to make it more seaworthy, but we do not know whether they used nails (wood or bronze) or burrings (furrings?) to connect them.
One of the boats' hull is also shown as painted with birds and dolphins, and it may be that they used some painted cloth to 1. protect the wood from drying and springing leaks in the hot mediterranean sun (still done today, hanging wet towels overboard on wooden boats in the summer for protection), or 2. to make them water-tight at all.
This exhibition featured the view that the stern protrusions were used as rams, while also showing a version of this arrangement to better pull it out of the water as you described. We can't be sure, until we build a real replica and try it out.
I know that you are also sailing, so my theory is:
Looking at the frieze i noticed that some boats are being rowed or paddled, others only use the wind, or both. There is always that helmsman/tillerman/'cox'(?) holding a rudder at the the right "starboard -
steuerbord Steuer=rudder!" side, like with those later Viking ships.
Sometimes two rudders and helmsmen (both sides) are shown, but the boats with this rear contraption only show one, at the "right"/starboard side.
Those boats had no real keel, and of course not one like we use today on smaller yachts, so could it be this rear "stabiliser" (for loss of a better word) is a kind of help to keep the boat on course through the water, while cutting across with less effort (only one helmsman/one rudder needed here)? (even yard-rigged boats can cut across, if only up to 60 degrees or so, if at all).
The ropes being there to lift the steering help out, or deploy it, into the water..
What do you think?
All the best,
Kai