Thanasis

Gentlemen; just a couple of points:
 
1. Please keep the discussion on a rational and polite basis at all times.  If it degenerates into arguments and name calling it may have to be closed down.
 
2.  Please also remember that although many of these vessels resemble staysail schooners, they are, in fact, specialised Mediterranean fishing and trading rigs and will have their own special local names, which no one has investigated as yet.
 
Have fun trying to figure them out! 
 
John

It's a poor form of discussion when the first resort is to denigrate anyone who disagrees with you. Poorer still to double down on that. And just for the record, I've done many thousands of miles at sea, under sail. 😀 
 
Anyway, jackasses aside 😁, back to rig #2.  On further reflection, it rather resembles a Galiot (per the model below), although the hull looks much more Mediterranean than North Sea, and I think the Galiot was very much a rig of the North Sea and the Baltic.  I am sure that all these rigs had local names, it would be interesting to know if there was a formal nomenclature for them.
 

 
The USN Boxer is most undoubtedly a brigantine, no debate there.  It has a fully square-rigged foremast, not a schooners foremast with a couple of square topsails.  The lower mast is short - barely half the height of the lower mainmast, so it sets a forecourse, much wider than it is deep, rather than a square foresail, much deeper than it is wide.  This is topped by a single topsail, a single topgallant and a royal.   In all of that it bears very little resemblance to the rig in #2.
 
Ketches commonly carried square sails on the foremast in older times.  There are a number of well-known model subjects of such vessels - Speedwell, Granado etc. It's only in more recent times that the ketch rig became a purely fore-and-aft rig.
 
As DrPR notes, there are many variations on all of these rigs, some of which defy the most fervent taxonomist.  
 
 

Again I have to agree with Bob Cleek about that "topsail staysail ketch/hermaphrodite brig/brigantine" or whatever you want to call it ((the second picture in Thananasis' original post).
 
I did find a reference to a "topsail ketch" in the Unusual Rigs chapter of Harold Underhill's Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship & Ocean Carrier, Brown Son and Ferguson, Ltd., Glasgow, 1972, page 229. Yes, Underhill was British, and we all know they actually think they invented the English language, but I have to be cautious what I say here because my wife was British. Yes dear, who is to say that the British terminology is less valid than any other?
 
He mentions a "schooner-ketch" and says "Another name, and I think a more appropriate one, is topsail ketch." But, as Bob mentions, a ketch would have a gaff sail on the main (fore) mast. Underhill says "The [main] gaff and boom are proportionately longer than would be the case with the schooner because the mizzen mast is stepped much further aft." Picture 2 doesn't have a boom on the fore mast, so it isn't a true ketch. So maybe it was a ketch-brigantine? But whoever heard that term used?
 
However, some sources just say a two masted vessel with the fore/main mast taller than the aft/mizzen is a ketch it the mizzen is stepped forward of the rudder. By that definition is is a ketch.
 
On page 228 Underhill also discusses the staysail schooner with a topsail on the fore mast and asks "Is she a schooner or brigantine? Your guess is as good as mine, for to the best of my knowledge the rig has never been defined and really has no name." ... "Perhaps the best description would be "square-rigged staysail-schooner", anyway the reader can take his choice." He goes on for another half page discussing variants of this rig and what they might be called.
 
And Bob gets a star for identifying the "fisherman's topsail."
 
Underhill has 17 pages of "unusual rigs" and it all reinforces my belief that just about anything that was possible to rig has probably floated somewhere at some time. And even common rigs have different names in different places and different times.
 
****
 
In Underhills Sailing Ship Rigs and Rigging, Brown, Son and Ferguson, Glasgow, 1969, page 4 he uses the term "Jackass-Rig" as any unusual combination of masts or sails. So in Thanasis' original post there are pictures of jackass-rig 1, jackass-rig 2, jackass-rig 3 and another jackass-rig 1.
 
But he does mention the "hermaphrodite brig" with square rigged fore mast (no gaff sail) and fore-and-aft rigged main mast. The illustration shows staysails between the masts. He says the term hermaphrodite brig is no longer used and it is called a brigantine. He shows sail plans for hermaphrodite brigs Raven and Juan De La Vega on page 46 and 48.
 
He also describes staysail schooners as "... all canvas, with the exception of the main, is set on fore-and-aft stays and saves the weight of spars aloft." The main sail is rigged to a boom, but may be gaff rigged or just a triangular "Bermuda rig." He shows a plan for the very unusual three masted staysail schooner John Williams V."

Interesting information. Obviously a localized type and perhaps now extinct. From the contemporary drawings, the gaff mizzen sail indicated a later evolution. The vessel may indeed be "Ottoman," certainly as the drawings confirm.
 
Until a better term is discovered, in consideration of it's apparent national origin, why don't we call it a "turkey?"  

To my eye, the mainsail on the brig appears to be tightly furled on the main yard.
 
You are indeed correct that the Thames barge carries a spritsail rig.

I follow Harold Underhill's guidance when it comes to naming rigs.  I therefore agree with Mark P, I don't think #2 is a brigantine either. More like a topsail ketch, a rare rig but certainly one that existed, although it is strange that it has staysails between the masts rather than a gaff foresail on the foremast.
 
To be a brigantine it needs to have a fully square-rigged foremast, which typically includes having a fairly short fore (lower) mast. The mast on #2 is more like the foremast of a topsail schooner (except that as the mainmast is shorter than the foremast it can't be a schooner). It's an unusual rig, for sure.  A bit of a dog's breakfast!
 
Thanasis, nice work on identifying #3. The sketches from the ANZAC soldier nail it, don't they?  I assume this rig must have had a local name, but I'm no expert on naming conventions for Mediterranean rigs so I'll abstain on that one.
 
I agree that #1 and #4 are fore and aft staysail schooners.

Mark,
 
It was not uncommon for topsail schooners to carry a fore course - a square sail suspended from the lower yard. I have seen several examples in books about schooners, such as the French privateer Le Comtesse Emererian 1810, ex privateer Herald or HMS Pictou 1815, HMS Sea Lark and HMS Alban1817, US revenue Cutter Louisiana 1819, and slaver Mary Adeline 1852. Howard Chapelle's "The Baltimore Clipper" has numerous other examples, including drawings from Marestier taken off ships and published in 1824.
 
A fore course doesn't seem to be common on modern topsail schooners, but some photos (below) of the modern French Navy Belle Poule show her flying a square course with a spar to the clew something like a spinnaker or a studding sail! Note that they also have a water sail on the main boom, so they are spreading a lot of canvas to catch the wind. Like about everything else I have seen about schooner rigging it seems to have been up to the owner's/captain's whim.
 

 
While I agree that brigantines are supposed to have a taller main mast than a fore mast, what else would you call the second example? I'd call it a topsail ketch but I have never heard that name used!

I checked Marquardt, and he does not name the rigs of ships from regions other than the northern European regions. He labels the shiptypes, not the rigs.
 
I don't know how it is in Turkey, but in the Netherlands, you can sort of classify the shiptypes, but there are many 'in betweens', as ships were always build by a specific builder for a specific buyer. Ie: it was not type x that was agreed upon but a ship 'like the one you build for my neighbor, but I would liketo have it slightly different'. 
 
I do very much like the (for a Dutchman) rather excentric rigs, and sometimes completely different ways of sailhandling that you see in the mediterranean ships.
 
Jan

Happy New Year to Everyone!
 
Greetings to Bob especially; speaking from my room 😁, I have to query the truth of the brigantine ID for the second vessel. A brigantine has a fully square-rigged foremast, and the after, or main mast, is taller than the foremast, which this one is not. I agree that there does seem to be a foresail furled tight in the centre of the lower yard, which would make it not a topsail schooner; but only two square sails on a whole mast is rather too few to constitute a full set of square sails, I would say. This could be a cut-down version of a larger rig, forced on the captain by lack of money in the final years of sail, and not quite conforming to any set definition. It almost looks like a cutter-rig with a mizen mast added.
 
All the best,
 
Mark P

Dear all happy New Year and thank you for participating this puzzle.
As most of you I can recognize typical ships' riggings and name the type of sails. I do can see Schooner types with something less or more (topsail-staysail...) but what I'm looking fore is how I could call them in a conversation or in writing. That's why I quest for a "proper name".
For the history these types of vessels-rigging were shown in North Aegean Sea at early of 20th century and I would define their origin mainly as Ottoman.
As about the third photo for which there is much thinking and being a bit familiar, I see an older or "Ottoman" version  of a "penna rigging" (yelkenli çektirme in Turkish) (Bermuda rig).
I call it "Ottoman" version since to my knowledge there was also a newer or "Greek" version (mostly was used by Greeks) where the triangular sail (penna) is attached on the mast, instead of on an additional spar. But here, we might have  a third version…More info information might be retrieved from the sketches of an ANZAC Soldier in Lemnos Island…) 
See photos

 

 
So, I know it's difficult to guess what those sailors were thinking, nor to find the original name of the rigs, but I'm trying to give at least a "short" explanatory name.
Thx

I agree with Bob. His naming is about as good as you can get for these rigs.
 
The second rig is similar to a hermaphrodite brig (also called a brigantine), but doesn't appear to have a full square sail rig on the fore mast as brigs as brigantines are supposed to have. Also, every picture I have seen (and most definitions) of brigantines has had the main mast as tall as or taller than the fore mast.
 
Ketches are two masted vessels with the mizzen (after) mast positioned ahead of the rudder/tiller and shorter than the main (fore) mast, as in the second rig, but the main mast is usually rigged fore and aft with a gaff sail, and no square topsail. Without the topsail on the main mast our second rig might be called a "staysail ketch" but I have never seen that term used. Topsail ketch?
 
The third rig is strange. I'd call it a "mule" as it appears to be a cross between a schooner and a dhow or felucca. Let's hope it too is sterile and cannot reproduce!
 
The sail rig on the Thames barge is called a spritsail.

The first is a staysail schooner with a boomed foresail, flying a fisherman topsail.
 
The second is a brigantine.
 
The third photograph isn't sufficiently clear to determine what we're looking at.  Unlike the other three photos, which are indisputable, this one's identity depends upon what's happening where the odd, long-sparred jib-headed sail meets the mast. Is it attached to the mast with gaff jaws, or is it crossing the mast as would a lateen antenna.  In the case of the former, it might be called gaff schooner with a weirdly long foresail gaff boom, and in the latter instance, a lateen-rigged ketch with a gaff-rigged mizzen. In the case of a lateen rig, it appears that the picture was taken while the foot of the mainsail antenna was being tacked from one side of the mast to the other. If the long boom is connected to the mast, it may have been a rig adaptation, similar to the arrangement seen on the Thames barges, which accommodated local fishing or cargo handling requirements.
 
The fourth is another staysail schooner.
 
The rest of you guys... That was pathetic. Go to your rooms!!!     
 
Thames barge:
 
 

The problem is that the naming conventions I know, is not realy compatible with these mediterranean ships....
I don't think  1 is qualifying as a schooner, as both sails between the masts are stay-sails, and a two-masted schooned has gaff-sails on both masts.
 
I have a book by Marquardt, he also covers these type of ships. Will have a look tomorrow.
 
Jan

No.1 Brigentine
No.2 Ketch
The last two I am not sure of. 
 

Good Evening Thanasis;
 
I am far from being an expert on small ships of this type, but I would say that no. 1 is a two-masted schooner, with a large main-topmast staysail; no. 2 is a two-masted topsail schooner (fond memories here: the second model I ever made, forty years ago now, was one of these) The third I am not sure about, although as she appears to be at anchor she is probably drying her sails, in which case it is just possible that the triangular mainsail is not actually triangular. It does appear to be some kind of triangular lug-sail, though. The fourth is also a two-masted schooner.
 
If anyone knows a specific name for these rigs, I would love to hear it as well.
 
All the best,
 
Mark P

Happy New Year to all.
Could someone identify or at least give a proper name in these rigs...
Many thanks

 

 

 

 
 

Happy New Year to all.
Could someone identify or at least give a proper name in these rigs...
Many thanks

 

 

 

 
 

My golden rule when I have to build many same items, is to be innovative and creative
avoiding working on one of those at a time. 
Thx

Hi. I used to  build ships in bottles many years before. 
 So once, I accepted the challenge to built a ship in a vertical bottle and because I was young and impatient, the result came up rather poor.
But  allow me to say these.
The method is the same as in a horizontal bottle, although you had to transform a bit your tools. And  you are not "pulling the string straight up"...
Back then, all of my strings were either "dead" (no pieces to pull outside the bottle) or there were only a few, that were going in holes in the bowsprit from above and were coming out from beneath. 
So after they were glued, I had to "push the strings down"  before to cut them. For this I was using an ombrela's rib properly shaped, keeping each string down while I was cutting it with another tool.
Last advice, the old one. Choosing the bottle make the test and try to read a piece of news paper through the glass. If you can read the most of it, the bottle passes the test, otherwise it will hide your work.
Thank you

My golden rule when I have to build many same items, is to be innovative and creative
avoiding working on one of those at a time. 
Thx

With the completion of the oars and the stand, we're all done!  More photos on the completed scratch-built page...
 
 

So very, very true! The older we get, the more we realize how easily history, ours or the culture's, is lost. 

Thanks for the link, Thanasis. If the two types of mainsails were contemporaneous, this might be a good solution. However, the differences of the sailing eras, their shapes, and construction suggest that another term might be appropriate.
 
Even Bob's suggestion is problematic, though appreciated. The definition of "jib-headed," according to several contemporary dictionaries, is essentially "a point at the top of the sail, like a jib." The short spar at the head of Galilee's mainsail (as well as Matthew Turner's) doesn't leave a point with a single attachment fitting, like an eye or thimble. The short spar evidently spreads out the significant local stresses. The mainsail generated huge stresses, demonstrated in the fact that her main boom broke during her first charter cruise.
So, lacking any authoritative reference from Matthew Turner's time, I'm inclined to describe it as a "spar-headed mainsail."
 
Thanks for your input, guys!
 
Terry
 

Ah, this explanation makes more sense. I was viewing the term "triangular sail" in a much narrower way than necessary. And I probably gave the spreader/batten or whatever we can call it more significance than needed.
 
Appreciate the clear and complete clarification, Bob.
 
Terry

Call it what you will, but the two types of mainsails were very much contemporaneous for hundreds of years before Turner designed Galilee. A jib-headed sail has an essentially triangular shape and a "pointy" head with a single halyard. A gaff-headed sail has four corners with two halyards, a throat halyard which hoists the throat of the gaff boom and a peak halyard which hoists the end of the gaff boom. Galilee definitely has "a single attachment fitting." It's the bridle or saddle running on the short bridle at the head of the sail with the fall of the mail halyard attached. The "stick" which holds the two ends of the bridle apart when under tension, isn't a "yard," which crosses a mast, nor a "boom," which has sheets that control a sail. If named for its function, it is clearly a "spreader" or a "batten." I would called it a "head batten," in the same way it's modern equivalent is called a "head board." Galilee has but one main halyard. Her sail is triangular shaped. It's indisputably a "jib-headed" mainsail.
 
The purpose of the spreader and bridle is the same as the purpose of the main halyard crane: to provide a fair lead of tension from the halyard crane to the mainsail without the halyard fall (bottom) block being pulled toward the mast and chaffing, thereby interfering with the operation of the main halyard tackle. The bridle spread by the "stick" on Galilee's main is the contemporary equivalent of of a "headboard" on a modern jib-headed mainsail.
 
The "stick" between the bridle ends is under a compression load created by the weight of the mainsail (and perhaps the main boom, depending upon whether it were fastened to the mast with a gooseneck or boom jaws.) That load is not particularly related in any way to the loads generated by the wind on the sail. Those wind loads are transferred to the sheets and create a compression load on the main boom far greater than the load created by the weight of the sail and boom, which contribute nothing to the load on the main boom. A properly designed main boom would not likely break under the load of any wind on the mainsail. (As the wind blows against a sail, the vessel heels, thereby proportionately reducing the pressure on the rig by reducing the amount of area directly exposed to the wind as the angle of heel increases.) However, an uncontrolled jibe would create a shock load when the boom fetched up against the mainsheet on the opposite tack which could cause a fracture as pictured above. To prevent such damage, many contemporary vessels of Galilee's size employed a patent "shock absorbing" mainsheet horse which I believe Galilee had, but which, apparently, was not up to the task in the instance pictured.
 
 
Gaff-rigged main showing use of halyard crane with tackle attached to the gaff boom throat, causing throat halyard to run free of the mast.
 
 

 
Gaff boom bridle saddle on bridle with halyard fall block attached:
 

 
Modern mainsail headboard: