trippwj

Here is the HMS Victory Conservation Management Plan (13 MB pdf) which dates the various parts of the ship.
victory_cmp_volume_01-.pdf

The CG question/comment is a bit of a red herring. If the CG was so high that it alone caused the ship to topple in while dry dock, there’s no way that ship should ever even have been allowed near water to begin with.  

As an engineer I’m sure you already know that an object on solid ground will not topple over unless its CG is forced outside of its footprint on the ground.
 
For anyone else who’s unsure:  if you consider a transport truck (or lorry, whatever your personal terminology preference), regardless of how high the load is, the vehicle remains stable provided the centre of gravity remains somewhere between the outside edge of the tires (tyres).
 
In the case of this ship in dry dock, correctly shored (or blocked) the CG would have had to shift laterally, beyond the ship’s side (or outermost row of blocks) for it to topple. If the shores were fixed to the ship’s side, the CG would have to shift beyond where the shores meet the dockside.
 
I’ve seen the docking plans for the dry cargo ships I’ve worked on. Most of them just show the required block placement, the drain plugs for the various tanks, as well as other various inlets and outlets in the hull (pump intakes, etc). I don’t recall seeing much on shoring, as it has become an extremely rare form of dry docking.
 
For what it’s worth, even on an extremely shapely hull form, like the Petrel, there was enough of a flat bottom that an outboard row of blocks could have been placed (even if it was only in the midship area). She didn’t specifically need to be dry docked as she was.
 
I agree, though, that it will be interesting to see what the MAIB has to say.
 
Andy

There's an interesting article in the 30th March edition of the London Review of Books about the pirate settlements and retirement places in Madagascar. It points to the fact that they did in fact establish democratic and libertarian societies there, which in turn led to the emancipation of women. So not all tales of pirates were fanciful.
 
For anyone interested in a good read, go to https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v45/n07/francis-gooding/when-thieves-retire,
 
The article is free to read, although if you want to read more stuff in the LRB you'd have to contribute.
 
Happy reading!
 
Tony

If you can find a copy, “Sloop of War, 1650-1763” by Ian McLaughlan is a great resource. 

Andy

Vasco da Gama - first round the Cape of Good hope to India in 1497-1499. So yes, these spices came the traditional way - over land and through several middle men.
 
Gribshunden was a royal carrack, as far as they've been able to make out. She was the king's flagship. But nomenclature varies - as far as I'm aware, what we call a carrack was referred to in Scandinavia as a Kravell (from caravel). Here's her dragon (griffin-hound, actually) figurehead being retrieved from the Baltic:
 

 
Steven

Interestingly (or not 😉) we overcame this in the Electricity Transmission sector with the guys who climb the lattice towers / pylons, they are equipped with two very large Caribiners on separate lanyards and the mantra was ‘clip on clip off’ with the alternate lanyards so you were always secure.  Watching them climb was like watching a mountaineer using an ice pick in each hand only a lot faster!
 
Fair play to anyone who climbs heights, I like to cuddle terra firms whilst watching others.
 
Gary
 

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/spices-500-year-old-shipwreck-baltic
 

To the best of my knowledge there are no copies outside of the British Library, although it is possible that researchers have been allowed to photograph it. Barker (2002) indicates that some of the text was published in the following ( I have not checked into it to see if that may be true)
Albertis, Enrico Alberto d’, Le Costruzioni Navali e l’arte Della Navigazione al Tempo Di Cristoforo Colombo, 1893 <https://echo.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/ECHOdocuView?url=/permanent/shipbuilding/Alber_Le-co_01_1893/index.meta&viewMode=auto&pn=1>  
There are many references to it, such as this listing:
‘The Trombetta Manuscript – The Nautical Archaeology Digital Library’ <https://shiplib.org/index.php/collections/historical-sources/treatises-on-shipbuilding/the-trombetta-manuscript/> [accessed 27 March 2023] This post discusses the manuscript briefly:
https://www.doaks.org/newsletter/news-archives/2021/shipwrecks-mathematics-and-manuscripts
Anderson describes it here:
Anderson, R. C., ‘Italian Naval Architecture about 1445’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 11.2 (1925), 135–63 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1925.10655310> and
Anderson, R. C., ‘Jal’s “Memoire No. 5” and the Manuscript “Fabbrica Di Galere”’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 31.3 (1945), 160–67 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1945.10658920>  
Also see
Rieth, Eric, ‘First Archaeological Evidence of the Mediterranean Whole Moulding Ship Design Method: The Example of the Culip VI Wreck, Spain (XIIIth-XIVth c.)’, in Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, ed. by H Nowacki and Matteo Valleriani, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003), pp. 9–16 <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF>  
A brief side note, the author is actually NOT named Trombetta - he is a "Trumpeter of Modon" Possibly named Zorzi di Nicolò or Giorgio. I recall there being a later Mariner's Mirror note that corrected Anderson, just can't put my fingers on it right now.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Typically these indicate a cross-section between the arrows. The arrows show from which direction the cross-section is viewed.

To the best of my knowledge there are no copies outside of the British Library, although it is possible that researchers have been allowed to photograph it. Barker (2002) indicates that some of the text was published in the following ( I have not checked into it to see if that may be true)
Albertis, Enrico Alberto d’, Le Costruzioni Navali e l’arte Della Navigazione al Tempo Di Cristoforo Colombo, 1893 <https://echo.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/ECHOdocuView?url=/permanent/shipbuilding/Alber_Le-co_01_1893/index.meta&viewMode=auto&pn=1>  
There are many references to it, such as this listing:
‘The Trombetta Manuscript – The Nautical Archaeology Digital Library’ <https://shiplib.org/index.php/collections/historical-sources/treatises-on-shipbuilding/the-trombetta-manuscript/> [accessed 27 March 2023] This post discusses the manuscript briefly:
https://www.doaks.org/newsletter/news-archives/2021/shipwrecks-mathematics-and-manuscripts
Anderson describes it here:
Anderson, R. C., ‘Italian Naval Architecture about 1445’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 11.2 (1925), 135–63 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1925.10655310> and
Anderson, R. C., ‘Jal’s “Memoire No. 5” and the Manuscript “Fabbrica Di Galere”’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 31.3 (1945), 160–67 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1945.10658920>  
Also see
Rieth, Eric, ‘First Archaeological Evidence of the Mediterranean Whole Moulding Ship Design Method: The Example of the Culip VI Wreck, Spain (XIIIth-XIVth c.)’, in Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, ed. by H Nowacki and Matteo Valleriani, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003), pp. 9–16 <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF>  
A brief side note, the author is actually NOT named Trombetta - he is a "Trumpeter of Modon" Possibly named Zorzi di Nicolò or Giorgio. I recall there being a later Mariner's Mirror note that corrected Anderson, just can't put my fingers on it right now.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

To the best of my knowledge there are no copies outside of the British Library, although it is possible that researchers have been allowed to photograph it. Barker (2002) indicates that some of the text was published in the following ( I have not checked into it to see if that may be true)
Albertis, Enrico Alberto d’, Le Costruzioni Navali e l’arte Della Navigazione al Tempo Di Cristoforo Colombo, 1893 <https://echo.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/ECHOdocuView?url=/permanent/shipbuilding/Alber_Le-co_01_1893/index.meta&viewMode=auto&pn=1>  
There are many references to it, such as this listing:
‘The Trombetta Manuscript – The Nautical Archaeology Digital Library’ <https://shiplib.org/index.php/collections/historical-sources/treatises-on-shipbuilding/the-trombetta-manuscript/> [accessed 27 March 2023] This post discusses the manuscript briefly:
https://www.doaks.org/newsletter/news-archives/2021/shipwrecks-mathematics-and-manuscripts
Anderson describes it here:
Anderson, R. C., ‘Italian Naval Architecture about 1445’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 11.2 (1925), 135–63 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1925.10655310> and
Anderson, R. C., ‘Jal’s “Memoire No. 5” and the Manuscript “Fabbrica Di Galere”’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 31.3 (1945), 160–67 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1945.10658920>  
Also see
Rieth, Eric, ‘First Archaeological Evidence of the Mediterranean Whole Moulding Ship Design Method: The Example of the Culip VI Wreck, Spain (XIIIth-XIVth c.)’, in Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, ed. by H Nowacki and Matteo Valleriani, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003), pp. 9–16 <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF>  
A brief side note, the author is actually NOT named Trombetta - he is a "Trumpeter of Modon" Possibly named Zorzi di Nicolò or Giorgio. I recall there being a later Mariner's Mirror note that corrected Anderson, just can't put my fingers on it right now.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

To the best of my knowledge there are no copies outside of the British Library, although it is possible that researchers have been allowed to photograph it. Barker (2002) indicates that some of the text was published in the following ( I have not checked into it to see if that may be true)
Albertis, Enrico Alberto d’, Le Costruzioni Navali e l’arte Della Navigazione al Tempo Di Cristoforo Colombo, 1893 <https://echo.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/ECHOdocuView?url=/permanent/shipbuilding/Alber_Le-co_01_1893/index.meta&viewMode=auto&pn=1>  
There are many references to it, such as this listing:
‘The Trombetta Manuscript – The Nautical Archaeology Digital Library’ <https://shiplib.org/index.php/collections/historical-sources/treatises-on-shipbuilding/the-trombetta-manuscript/> [accessed 27 March 2023] This post discusses the manuscript briefly:
https://www.doaks.org/newsletter/news-archives/2021/shipwrecks-mathematics-and-manuscripts
Anderson describes it here:
Anderson, R. C., ‘Italian Naval Architecture about 1445’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 11.2 (1925), 135–63 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1925.10655310> and
Anderson, R. C., ‘Jal’s “Memoire No. 5” and the Manuscript “Fabbrica Di Galere”’, The Mariner’s Mirror, 31.3 (1945), 160–67 <https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.1945.10658920>  
Also see
Rieth, Eric, ‘First Archaeological Evidence of the Mediterranean Whole Moulding Ship Design Method: The Example of the Culip VI Wreck, Spain (XIIIth-XIVth c.)’, in Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, ed. by H Nowacki and Matteo Valleriani, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003), pp. 9–16 <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF>  
A brief side note, the author is actually NOT named Trombetta - he is a "Trumpeter of Modon" Possibly named Zorzi di Nicolò or Giorgio. I recall there being a later Mariner's Mirror note that corrected Anderson, just can't put my fingers on it right now.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

I doubt the ship was dry docked for that amount of time. That would cost a fortune, and cost the commercial shipyard a lot of lost business having a dock occupied for that amount of time. Tied up at a lay-by berth is what they’re referring to.
 
Modern dock supports are steel with wood bolsters bolted in place on top.
I did read that there were high winds at the time the ship was knocked off the blocks so it’s possible that either the blocks were not in the right place, or the ship shifted during the pump out and didn’t land correctly on the blocks. I wouldn’t speculate any further until the MAIB or whichever investigation authority is overseeing this incident, publishes its report.
 
Andy

On the other hand, modern authors have to draw on either printed sources of the time or on archival material.
 
Over the last few years many, if not most, of the printed sources have become available as digital copies through national libraries. Unfortunately, for most of the works that were digitised on behalf of Google they did not bother to unfold the plates/tables and, therefore, such copies are often pretty much wasted effort. The BnF usually does a good job in digitising their works.
 
The main value of modern works is having evaluated archival material (if really done), as this typically (still) is not accessible remotely. Archival work is time-consuming and costly, when involving travel.
 
Otherwise, if the research was done properly, the reference list may be the most valuable part in modern works - useful to give indications where to look further.

I guess it is time to get the Admiral involved as she is a retired French teacher.   HOPEFULLY the naval terminology will not throw too many clinkers into the fire.
Allan

In a way you've never seen it described before ... 😜
 
 

Certainly looks like a headsail, Martes. The ship is being warped along and, to take advantage of the very slight breeze almost abeam, perhaps this is taking advantage of it. The main and fore yards cannot be slewed around far enough to take advantage of this. The mizzen topsail appears to be able to, but the crossjack yard must have been let loose from its parrel and is controlled by the slings. Possibly it is even lashed to the mizzen shrouds as well?
 
Where is this image from?

Maybe I'm the only one, but I like the smell of old books, and old furniture. . . 

Mr Waldemar makes the following statements:
 
A) "I still have to mention here an alternative reconstruction of the method used to design this yacht, which I nevertheless find totally implausible"
 
I think this statement reflects on Mr. Waldemar's ability to understand it, not on the method which is elegantly simple. In fact the most simple contemporary method that the authors of the paper are aware of. 
 
"it is incomprehensible and it is doubtful whether it could be practically applied"
 
That it is incomprehensible to Mr. Waldemar suggests more of a closed mind in the commentator than in the method. It has been practically applied as demonstrated in the paper that he refers to. Both authors reconstructed the lines independently. I used ACAD and my fellow author used the traditional 17th century way of paper, pencil and cut out reconciling curves (based on the cono-cuneus geometry defined by Dr. Wallis). That Mr. Waldemar cannot see how a method derived and drawn on paper cannot be scaled up to apply on a prototype ignores the obvious truth that nearly all of the documented methods of mid to late 17th century do exactly this! i.e. draw them on paper using a mechanical process and then transfer this to the actual construction by scaling up the patterns used.
 
C) "the correspondence of the reconstructed lines presented in the publication with the original lines is only illusory, as I have personally verified"
 
You cannot verify a negative Mr. Waldemar. You may have found a method which does something similar but have not disproved the method.
 
D) "it is not clear why the lines conceived as curves of the least resistance should have been applied transversely to the hull"
 
The cono-cuneus curve was not conceived as a line of least resistance. It was conceived as a reconciling curve of the type known by us today as a 'French curve'. Peter Pett's method of arriving at it by cutting through a cono-cuneus solid was so ingenious that it amazed Dr. Wallis, one of the most eminent mathematicians of the day . . . so much so that he derived a mathematical treatise to define it. Its use in conjunction with a 'hanging conoid (as understood by Sutherland) guarantees a solid of low resistance. The author's investigated this by constructing numerous flow lines along the solid. They were all perfectly smooth -  unlike earlier methods which resulted in ripples in the flow lines. The method, thus, required no fairing.
 
Also, might I add, that if Mr. Waldemar has found a method which apparently is not dissimilar to Sutherlands published method, why was Sutherland so impressed with Pett's method? Why did he state in his treatise that he did not know how Pett did it?
 
I hope the points I have made might at least support our honest attempt to resolve a previously unsolved mystery. I congratulate Mr. Waldemar on his own work. However, I would like to point out that the only methods we know to be actually true are those few published by the contemporary practitioners such as Anthony Deane and William Sutherland. We do not even know for sure if the published methods were actually used as presented on real vessels. We have no extant ships to compare against, only models.  So all methods, including our C-C method, are conjectural. We have shown that this method fits some of the clues in the written literature and that it reasonable fits the shape of several yacht models.
 
My fellow author, and others I believe, has found the style of Mr. Waldemar's rhetoric so impolite that they have opted to withdraw from this debate. I, as the researcher who proposed this method, felt duty bound to respond on our behalf. In justification I can only point out that our paper was peer reviewed and published by the leading journal on Maritime History. We are humble enough for it to be criticised based on its content but not dismissed as illusory because Mr. Waldemar has found another method which satisfies him. If he is as confident in his research as implied by his statements, then let him go to the effort of substantiating it and getting it published it in a peer-reviewed academic journal.
 
I will not re-enter this debate as I fear it will once again deteriorate.
 
I, for one, am humbly amazed by the obvious ingenuity of those 17th century shipwrights. We follow them today 'on the shoulders of giants'.
 
Effie Moneypenny
 
 
 
 
 

1951, S.D. Krylov, a former machinist of Varyag, talks to young ship modellers. I'll bet he had a few tales. 
 

@T. Pevny
 
Welcome - I have been following your publications and am pleased to see your Thesis. I first came across you via your website while you were developing your chapter on the La Belle. For what it's worth, which admittedly is not much, I agree with your interpretation of the hull.  One of the challenges of attempting, from 5 centuries removed, the conceptualization and design processes used based on relatively sparse archival records along with limited archeological evidence of various degrees of completeness.
 
In the case of Mr. Baker, we have in his manuscript many examples of midship frames using varied sets of ratios - some more "reasonable" than others. Again, I have only had access to very small portions of Baker's Fragments so my views are based on secondary sources. Someday I hope to be able to review the full manuscript but, alas, with a budget of $2.50 that ain't likely any time soon!
 
I think that the debate on the Mary Rose will continue for some time - the lack of archival documentation from the time concerning the design practice leaves nearly all interpretation open to disparate views. No reasonable way to say which is right, wrong, more likely, or whatever. We are trying to get in the mind of shipbuilders that used a design method based on ratios and other mysterious knowledge (hence the request by Pepys to Deane and others). 
In addition to your study I am also working with Olaberria (2018) and the interpretation of ship design in Nowacki and Valleriani (eds, 2003) and Nowacki and Lefevre (eds, 2009) - there are some interesting studies included there.
 
As you note, there is a difference between the approach of the "scholar" working with written materials (primary and secondary) and the approach you are using. Both have value. Both contribute to advancing our understanding. From the perspective of the model builder, understanding the approach used to develop the basic curves of a vessel where plans were not used can aid in developing a reasonable hull shape for the scale model. The actual builder from those many centuries past is probably the only person that can objectively judge the accuracy.
 
Enough of my disjointed rambling. Thank you for engaging in this thread - I look forward to further dialogue in the future.
 
Nowacki, H, and Matteo Valleriani, eds., Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003) <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF> Nowacki, Horst, and Wolfgang Lefevre, eds., Creating Shapes in Civil and Naval Architecture: A Cross-Disciplinary Comparison (Brill, 2009) <https://brill.com/view/title/16337> [accessed 4 October 2022] Olaberria, Juan Pablo, ‘Ship Design-Knowledge in Early Modern Europe: Royal Yachts and the Shared Knowledge of Ship-Designers and Common Shipwrights’ (unpublished Doctor of Philosophy, University of Southampton, 2018) <https://www.academia.edu/36363637/Ship_design-knowledge_in_early_modern_Europe_Royal_yachts_and_the_shared_knowledge_of_ship-designers_and_common_shipwrights> [accessed 1 June 2020]

As  a person very devoted to quality in this field of research I am moved by your comments Waldemar and by the warm reception I have received from the members of this Forum as a whole. I am excited by the prospect of future exchanges of ideas!
 
P.S. @Waldemar I am of the same thinking in terms of our work being an interesting case of confirmation of ideas by independent work. I have looked enough at drawings  and such studies to know you never saw my work on English design before today. We can both still be wrong together:) but I think it adds weight to the underlying ideas.

@T. Pevny
 
Welcome - I have been following your publications and am pleased to see your Thesis. I first came across you via your website while you were developing your chapter on the La Belle. For what it's worth, which admittedly is not much, I agree with your interpretation of the hull.  One of the challenges of attempting, from 5 centuries removed, the conceptualization and design processes used based on relatively sparse archival records along with limited archeological evidence of various degrees of completeness.
 
In the case of Mr. Baker, we have in his manuscript many examples of midship frames using varied sets of ratios - some more "reasonable" than others. Again, I have only had access to very small portions of Baker's Fragments so my views are based on secondary sources. Someday I hope to be able to review the full manuscript but, alas, with a budget of $2.50 that ain't likely any time soon!
 
I think that the debate on the Mary Rose will continue for some time - the lack of archival documentation from the time concerning the design practice leaves nearly all interpretation open to disparate views. No reasonable way to say which is right, wrong, more likely, or whatever. We are trying to get in the mind of shipbuilders that used a design method based on ratios and other mysterious knowledge (hence the request by Pepys to Deane and others). 
In addition to your study I am also working with Olaberria (2018) and the interpretation of ship design in Nowacki and Valleriani (eds, 2003) and Nowacki and Lefevre (eds, 2009) - there are some interesting studies included there.
 
As you note, there is a difference between the approach of the "scholar" working with written materials (primary and secondary) and the approach you are using. Both have value. Both contribute to advancing our understanding. From the perspective of the model builder, understanding the approach used to develop the basic curves of a vessel where plans were not used can aid in developing a reasonable hull shape for the scale model. The actual builder from those many centuries past is probably the only person that can objectively judge the accuracy.
 
Enough of my disjointed rambling. Thank you for engaging in this thread - I look forward to further dialogue in the future.
 
Nowacki, H, and Matteo Valleriani, eds., Shipbuilding Practice and Ship Design Methods from the Renaissance to the 18th Century: A Workshop Report, Preprint 245 ([Berlin]: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte, 2003) <https://www.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/Preprints/P245.PDF> Nowacki, Horst, and Wolfgang Lefevre, eds., Creating Shapes in Civil and Naval Architecture: A Cross-Disciplinary Comparison (Brill, 2009) <https://brill.com/view/title/16337> [accessed 4 October 2022] Olaberria, Juan Pablo, ‘Ship Design-Knowledge in Early Modern Europe: Royal Yachts and the Shared Knowledge of Ship-Designers and Common Shipwrights’ (unpublished Doctor of Philosophy, University of Southampton, 2018) <https://www.academia.edu/36363637/Ship_design-knowledge_in_early_modern_Europe_Royal_yachts_and_the_shared_knowledge_of_ship-designers_and_common_shipwrights> [accessed 1 June 2020]

@trippwj
 
Wayne - I am so happy you are familiar with my website. Some day I hope to get back to it. I think the format that I created for the posts (with perpetual updates that could be referenced) has a lot of potential, but since I was building the web site myself from scratch - it was very time consuming. For others that may not have seen my website is tangencypress.com (hopefully one day active again).
 
I found the Nowacki (and company) publications very exciting at the time they came out (& the associated workshop...). I was hoping that level of intensity of work and exchange of ideas on ship design would continue - maybe it still will one day.
 
I actually think that model building - like you all do - is critical to the research as well. Richard Steffy - as you no doubt all know - was a committed research model builder. I worked building a partial full-scale "reconstruction" of the 7th-century Yassiada vessel in a museum in Turkey, and Mr. Steffy's original model was in the room as a reference (as well as often the original reconstructor of the archaeological remains - Fred van Doorninck). I love working with original written sources, but ultimately one has to establish/confirm their relationship to the practical realities of shipbuilding (at whatever scale possible & affordable:)