Louie da fly

A couple of days ago I saw in the archaeological report of Texas A&M University's excavation of ships from the Yenikapi find in Istanbul, something I hadn't noticed before . The drawing of the most intact galley of all, a light galea known as YK4, includes a diagram of the 35th frame of the vessel, which is effectively a midship section. Out of curiosity I printed it off as large as I could, drew up a grid of 1 metre squares around it and copied its shape on my computer to the same scale as the plans for the proposed dromon model, taken from Professor John Pryor's reconstruction. To compare the two I superimposed the images, and the correspondence was uncanny - at the point they diverge most, the discrepancy between the two shapes is only about 50mm! That a theoretical reconstruction, particularly given the scarcity of information available to base it on, turned out to be so close to the archaeological reality is amazing. Needless to say, I was very impressed, and I take my hat off to Professor Pryor. The only major difference I could see was that the dromon's tholes appeared to be about 170mm higher than those of the ship found in Istanbul. But that was a galea, vessel with just a single bank of oars. A double-banked dromon would be considerably larger and heavier and would sit deeper in the water, so the tholes would be lower. Taking the galea's waterline as being at the bottom of the lowest of the three wales, I re-did the superimposition. They line up perfectly. This has confirmed my confidence in the reconstruction, and that I'll be making something that is very close indeed to the reality of the actual vessel. Steven

Well the Texas A&M University built the bow half of the more complete galley they excavated, but at a scale of 1:10 it took up all the room they had available. I'm afraid my model will have to be POB, as the frames on the original are so frail it would be impossible to do it POF to 1:50 scale (they'd be about 1.2x1.2 mm) and the planking would be 0.4mm thick! But I believe even POB it's going to shed a fair bit of light on how these vessels worked. The whole subject of how they travelled in these things is fascinating. For example, after several hours' rowing, what would they do for toilet breaks? Would there be a rush for the side, unstabilizing the ship? Would they have to have a roster? Who knows . . . Steven

I've added a couple more PDFs of the dromon drawings - a transverse section with crew, and views showing just the vessel itself - (no crew, oars, shields etc) showing the shape of the hull more clearly. The thing is incredibly narrow - at 1:50 it's 62.5 cm ( just under 2 feet) long, but only 9cm (4 inches) wide. The drawings aren't to any particular scale - I had to reduce them to fit on an A3 sheet. As you can see, not much room in the ship once the crew's aboard. I haven't really sorted out the rigging yet - I have more work to put into it, but there's plenty of time for that before I get to the stage where it's needed. Apparently a Greek Fire projector emits a very loud roaring sound when it's in operation. You might note that it's in the shape of a lion, an innovation introduced in the late 11th century by Emperor Alexios I, to further terrify the enemy - as if flames shooting across the waves at you, and the surface of the water burning wasn't enough! Steven PS: Sorry about the pictures being on their side. Just the way they turned out, I'm afraid. transverse section crewed.dwg Model (1).pdf dromon hull only.pdf

Well, actually I just wrote to Professor Pryor and to my surprise he answered. Perhaps that he was at the University of Sydney and that anybody else in Australia was interested in dromons had something to do with it. I've had success with this kind of thing in a previous life as a mediaeval re-enactor, by the way. I've written to the UK, France, even Hungary and got replies - even in one case a copy of a paper written by the person I wrote to. It's been my experience that academics are often quite willing to help someone in the lay public who shares their enthusiasms. I've had my share of 'no replies' as well, but all in all I've been pleasantly surprised by the generosity and helpfulness shown by specialists whom I've asked for assistance. Steven

This is the very beginnings of a build log. Until I have finished renovating the house, there’s no chance of actually doing any building – no time, and no space available. But in my free moments I’ve been researching and drawing up plans for a Byzantine dromon of the 10th-11th century. The name dromon (Greek = “runner”) was originally applied to a class of fast Roman galleys with a single bank of oars developed around the 6th century AD. Over the centuries, as the Roman Empire shifted its emphasis to the East and gained a new capital in Constantinople (modern Istanbul) and evolved into what we now know as Byzantium, the dromon changed as well, until by the 10th century AD it was a very different vessel with two banks of oars, lateen sails and armed with a devastating weapon, pyr thalassion – Greek fire. Greek fire is generally accepted as having been made of naphtha, a naturally occurring substance similar to petroleum. Contemporary descriptions led Prof. John Haldon to work out theoretical design using only technology known at the time, and then put it into practice, with spectacular results (see https://books.google.com.au/books?id=q0hMf5vu7kgC&pg=PA289&lpg=PA289&dq=%22Greek+fire%22+revisited:+recent+and+current+research%22&source=bl&ots=Kwp5Xa3U62&sig=tR81SBsNfAc_uDLyuXDxe9uPWKA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=bjAzVc61C8TNmwWvv4HICw&ved=0CCYQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=%22Greek%20fire%22%20revisited%3A%20recent%20and%20current%20research%22&f=false - page 292 onward). Greek fire was used effectively in a considerable number of battles, destroying threatening enemy fleets. I was reported to have burnt on the surface of the water (and in the reconstruction that’s just what it does!). The definitive source on the dromon is the excellent, thorough and painstakingly researched book Age of the Dromon (http://www.brill.com/age-dromon-0) by Professor John Pryor and Elizabeth M. Jeffreys, which draws together all the clues as to the nature of the vessel, from its early development to its apogee in the 10th and 11th century. The available information is rare, widely scattered and often difficult to interpret. At the time it was written no remains of any Byzantine war-galley had ever been discovered, let alone a dromon, contemporary descriptions were vague and patchy (and in the case of at least one writer of the time, often wrong). Contemporary illustrations are equally unsatisfying and the conclusions and resulting reconstruction reached are a considerable achievement. There have been a lot of theoretical reconstructions of dromons over the years, many of which can be seen if you do a google image search for “dromon”. Some of them are quite ludicrously wrong – often clumsy and far too heavy for a vessel propelled by muscle power. Prof Pryor’s reconstruction is the best and most believable I have seen, and is based firmly on the available evidence. It would also make a fast and effective warship, which most of the others wouldn’t. The picture that emerges is of a long narrow vessel with 100 oars arranged in two banks of 25 on each side. Instead of an outrigger, the sides were flared outwards at the gunwales to allow a good angle of attack for the upper oars. The vessel was fully decked and had two lateen rigged masts and dual side rudders. There was a fortified forecastle, below which was the siphon for Greek Fire. On larger dromons each gunwale was built up amidships and fortified with a wooden ‘castle’. In the centuries between ancient and mediaeval galleys, shipbuilding techniques had changed from frameless shell-construction (in which adjoining planks were fastened together by many small wooden tenons fixed into slots in the edges of each strake), to fully framed construction which was far stronger, and unable to be sunk by ramming. Rather than a ram, the late dromon had a long detachable ‘spur’, intended to break the enemy’s oars, to destroy its motive power and manoeuvrability. Instead of sinking opposing vessels, the dromon’s crew used projectile weapons – bows, slings, ballistas and even flung stones to cause casualties on the enemy’s decks until they could pull alongside, grapple and board. The oarsmen of the upper bank doubled as marines, leaving the lower bank to manoeuvre the ship into position. Tests on Olympias, a full-sized reconstruction of an ancient Greek trireme built in the 1980s, determined that such long, thin, light vessels were very subject to the vagaries of the weather and were of very limited stability. It was discovered that it was impossible to row effectively in any sort of sea – waves one metre high were the upper limit – and a galley faced by bad weather had little choice but to run for shelter. Galleys were also poor sailers and could really only sail effectively in a gentle breeze – a heel of more than 10 degrees would swamp the vessel and it would have been all but impossible to sail into the wind. A dromon’s storage ability was minimal and on long trips it would have to put into port on almost a daily basis to replenish stores, (particularly water, which oarsmen need to consume in great amounts to stay effective) A galley’s length is determined by the interscalmium – the distance between the rowing benches. Age of the Dromon estimated the interscalmium to be about 1.0 metre (3’3”). Any closer together and the oarsmen foul each other; any further apart and you’re adding dead weight for the oarsmen to pull along for no reason. A galley with 25 benches in each bank would be about 25 metres long, plus extra for the bow and stern. A dromon was incredibly long for its width – the reconstruction in Age of the Dromon is 31.25 metres (95 feet 4 inches) long and its maximum beam amidships only 4.46 metres (13 feet 7 inches). Just as the book was about to be published in 2006 an amazing discovery was made in Istanbul. During excavations for an underground railway in the Yenikapi district of the city’s southern edge, workmen stumbled upon the Harbour of Theodosius, silted up and buried centuries before. Under the mud were the remains of 37 Byzantine ships dating from the 5th century to the eleventh century AD. Most were merchant vessels, but at least 6 were war galleys – not dromons unfortunately, but galeai – smaller and lighter single banked galleys used for scouting, and from which our word galley comes. The Yenikapi ships confirmed the theoretical dimensions of Age of the Dromon’s reconstruction – of the two galleys which still had their upper works in reasonable condition, the interscalmium of one varied between 0.90 and 0.97 metres, and the other between 0.874 and 1.048 metres, averaging 0.96. The length and beam of these galleys was consistent with the theoretical reconstruction. These vessels were incredibly lightly built – the thickness of the planking varied from 20 to 30mm (3/4”-1 ¼”, almost unbelievable in a vessel of that length, and the frame timbers averaged 60mm (2 ¼ ”) square. The ships were prevented from hogging by stringers inside the hull and heavy wales. Presumably dromons were similarly constructed, with extra stiffness provided by the full deck. I cannot adequately express my gratitude for the wonderful help freely given by Professor John Pryor and also by Dr Cemal Pulak of Texas A&M University. Professor Pryor has been incredibly helpful to a lubber like me and I owe to him almost everything I know of dromons, and certainly my decision that I could actually go ahead and make a model of one with a reasonable certainty of getting it right. He also referred me to his colleague Dr Cemal Pulak, (who took part in the excavation of eight of the Yenikapi ships, including two galleys). Dr Pulak was kind enough to send me a copy of his paper when it was published (it appears in the in the international Journal of Nautical Archaeology 2015 44.1; pages 39-73), as well as a photo of a partial reconstruction of the better preserved of the two galleys he excavated, built at a scale of 1:10. My model will follow Professor Pryor’s reconstruction as closely as possible, with a few modifications based on the Yenikapi finds and on some discoveries of my own when drawing up the model to scale. However, before constructing the full model, I plan to make a midships section at 1:20, with three sets of working oarsmen, as Professor Pryor pointed out that though theoretically the two banks of oars of his reconstructed dromon should not foul each other (Olympias had a lot of trouble with broken oars from fouling between oars of different banks), they have not been tested in the real world. I've attached a PDF of the plans in their current state of development. It should be very interesting. Steven dromon.dwg Model (1).pdf

Dick, you never cease to amaze me. That's a beautiful job. Steven

Far too late for that. I left sanity behind long ago - why else would I be into ship modelling? But I might just put the build log up anyway. Steven

I wish I knew. Even if I could justify taking the time off from renovating to make a start (which I can't), it's impossible because we currently live in a building site - even the rooms which have been finished are filled with stuff (disassembled cupboards, boxes of floor tiles, ceiling lights etc, homeless furniture) to go into the incomplete rooms when they're finished. There's nowhere to make a model ship even if I could spare the time right now. Fortunately, after over two years, we are finally approaching the end - plasterboard's up and due to have the joins gooped up in the next week, then painting, fitting architraves etc, second fix on plumbing and electricals etc etc etc. But it's going to be months yet . . . On the positive side, I've nearly completed drawing the plans for the dromon. I was thinking maybe I should start a build log, even if I can't do any building yet. Steven

Somehow I managed to miss this post when you put it up. SUCH a beautiful ship . . . (sigh).

That's a relief, Ben. I was afraid I might be in the unenviable position of pointing out something that would mean you had to pull it to bits and start again. The flexibility available to the oar banks is very impressive. Steven

Ben, I'm very impressed with your model, and particularly impressed with the most recent video of the oars in use. But it seems to me that the galley is backwatering(!) I hope I've got it wrong, but it seems to me that the oars go toward the stern, dip into the water, and then push towards the bow, which would push the galley sternwards. Steven

I was barefoot throughout my childhood in the 1950's in a suburb of Perth, the capital city of Western Australia. I only started wearing shoes on a regular basis when I went to high school. Before that it was Tuesday evenings (I was in the cub scouts) and on occasional trips to Perth. I found shoes constricting, and they're bad for the development of a child's feet. I had very tough soles to my feet, and I could walk on stony ground and some (not all) thorns without being bothered. The only major problem was stubbed toes - they could be painful and bloody, but they healed up pretty fast. If any kid had worn shoes at my primary school they would have been laughed out of the place. Nowadays I wear shoes all the time, and my feet are as tender as anyone else's, but if I go somewhere where I need a good grip (like walking on the roof of the house) I prefer to go barefoot. After all, barefoot is the natural way to go - our ancestors were barefoot for a million years before shoes were invented. They seem to have done all right. This doesn't answer the question of whether all sailors were bareoot on shipboard, but from my own experience there's no reason they couldn't have..

Hi, Chistine. There are quite a few Viking ship models on the build logs - the one most people have made is called the Oseberg ship. If you search that one up and have a look at few of those build logs you might find them of help. The most important thing is to have fun. Steven

The progress on the ship is very impressive, and I love the ballista. I want to make two of them for the dromon I'm planning to build (as well as a Greek fire siphon). Would it be ok to get in touch to pick your brains when the time comes? Steven

Woodrat, I agree with your analysis - I'm sure there were not only national variations but individual variations between shipbuilders to have a broad range of features and shapes in the same basic ship type. Though the following links relate to Iberian and English ships, you might find them of interest - Hull design and construction, and differences between English and Iberian framing practices - http://journals.hil.unb.ca/index.php/MCR/article/view/17791/22170 Portuguese vs Spanish Shipbuilding Practices: https://www.abc.se/~m10354/bld/portspan.htm Hull characteristics of 16th century Spanish and Portuguese ships: http://www.patrimoniocultural.pt/media/uploads/trabalhosdearqueologia/18/19.pdf There's also the (possibly Basque) Cavalaire wreck of 1479: The Mediaeval Shipwreck at Cavalaire: http://www.culture.gouv.fr/fr/archeosm/archeosom/en/caval-s.htm Oak growing, Hull design and Framing Style: The Cavalaire-sur-Mer Wreck c.1479 https://www.academia.edu/6921643/Oak_growing_hull_design_and_framing_style._The_Cavalaire-sur-Mer_wreck_c._1479 Archaeological Report (in French) on the Cavalaire Wreck: http://medieval-europe-paris-2007.univ-paris1.fr/M.Delhaye%20(ss%20ill.).pdf . - my French isn't good enough to translate it in full, but I've had Google translate this and now I'm working on turning it into proper English. and the Genoese Lomellina of 1516: http://www.culture.gouv.fr/fr/archeosm/archeosom/en/lomel-s.htm http://archeonavale.org/lomellina/an/l_6a.html I was fortunate enough to go aboard the 'Matthew' replica in Bristol when I was in the UK in 2009. Unfortunately my camera's memory card filled up just before I saw her (we were actually there to see Brunel's Great Britain), so I don't have any photos of my own, but there are some good ones at http://bidefordbuzz.org.uk/2012/03/matthew-calls-at-bideford-6th-march-2/ and the photo at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Matthew-BristolHarbour-Aug2004.jpg shows the lines of her bow, which may not be as fine as those of your own carrack, but are considerably less tubby than some of the contemporary pictures. Steven

Very nice. Really starting to get that typical carrack "look". One thing that interests me, and that in the beginning I had trouble accepting, is that this carrack has such fine lines. Most modern models and representations I have seen of carracks are very tubby compared with yours, but I believe you have the right of it. I think artists of the time had great difficulty portraying the bows correctly and often showed them much more rounded than they really were - not because that's how the ship was, but that they just couldn't work out how to portray the shape of a ship's bow seen from in front. The better artists like Carpaccio managed it, but others - the Beauchamp Pageant artist, for example, and even Master WA - just couldn't get it right. It makes sense to me that a carrack would be designed to swim as well as possible, and I believe archaeological finds back this up. The underwater lines of the Iberian "Newport" ship unearthed in Wales even seem to have been concave at the bow. Keep up the good work. She's looking brilliant. Steven

A very difficult operation, but the end result looks very good.

I like the idea of the shields, Hans. The one in the middle bears the Greek letter lambda, which signifies Lakedaimonia, the city-state of Sparta, and would only be seen on a Spartan ship. As far as I know, the other doesn't have any particular significance. Steven

I thought this link http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/9295-medieval-top/ from the Nautical History and Research section might be useful when it comes to rigging the carrack.. Steven

This is a fascinating build, particularly the mechanics of getting the oars to actually row. Following this with great interest. Oh, and the ship is beautiful, too.

This build never fails to bring up the interesting and unexpected. I knew there'd be an offset bowsprit, but the narrowness of the forecastle and the gaps in the planking are a fascinating surprise. Steven

You're doing amazing work, Alan. I only have AutoCAD LT, and I envy you the ability to work in 3D to work out problems before they arise. (On the other hand, I'm a bit of a dinosaur - I learnt my trade on a drawing board with pencil and ink-bow pens, so I'd probably feel uncomfortable with 3D - I tried it and though it was interesting and obviously had great potential, I felt happier with the old standard.) I'm really looking forward to seeing you putting this one into physical form. Steven

Wow! Steven

Looking really good, Michael. If I can even approach this level of skill I'll be more than happy. Steven

So, a svabel would be a swab, I suppose. As in "Arrrrh yer scurvy swabs!" A magnificent build, Matti. A pleasure to see. Steven