Roman Ship?

[SvenLittkowski]

Hi, this is Sven Littkowski, I am active in maritime archaeology (as a life-time hobby) since around 25 years. In the United States, three books feature some of my works in that field, and I also interact with Arvid Göttlicher (Germany) and did communicate with Lionel Casson (USA).

First, this thread is very interesting, and requires a listing of all links talking about ancient ships, coins, items and persons in the Americas. Mentioning just that some information is somewhere on the Internet is not enough, we need to be able to research on those links. Please list these links here.

While the typical Roman war galleys might have had tremendous problems to reach out that far over an ocean known to be stormy and generally uncalm, merchant ships might have been able to make it ... just. Also, while most Roman warship types were light-built galleys, with openings in the sides, the ships of the ancient tribe of the Veneters (not today's Venice, but a tribe located where today's France is) where been made for stormy weathers. So, IF any ship made it that far over tendencially stormy waters, then Veneter ships or cargo ships.

We know today, that the ancient people had some sea expeditions around the African continent, and that they also went up to the Baltic Sea and even to India (from harbors along Egypt's coast of the Red Sea). There were Roman colonies in India, and there was even an exchange of goods between Rome and China, but the Indians and Chinese did the sea transport on that route up to india, from where Roman ships took over partially (the Indians never wanted the Romans to know the passage to China).

I am running the project Forum Navis Romana, and have created some hundreds of high resolution side views of ancient ships of the Roman and Byzantine time and seas. I am linking to some of those who could have made this theoretical voyage to the Americas, and to some who couldn't have done it.

It is a question if they really made it, if that was then intentionally or accidentally. I am pretty good in web research, once I get some start links. I could tell you soon, how trustworthy and detail-correct those online resources are you all are mentioning.

By the way, I saw some links to ship reconstruction sketches showing ancient Roman ships with more than one main mast. Those sketches are faulty, Roman ships had no more than one main mast (and the diagonal artemon mast). Only some of the Gallo-Roman transport vessels of the Ponto type had up to three masts (two main masts and the artemon mast). Also, some of those sketches are based on totally false, pre-1900 Russian reconstruction sketches or on the "adventurious" Ben Hur movie ships (1950's, with Charlton Heston)...
Some of them, however, are correct.

To calculate between capable and incapable, I measured ship size, equipment, storage space, crew size, and sail size.

Possible Ship Types
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Possible01.jpg - converted former war galley - maybe just capable
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Possible02.jpg - one of the largest annona transporters, Ponto type - capable
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Possible03.jpg - smaller Ponto along the ancient French coast (St. Gervais) - capable
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Possible04.jpg - The Europa, impressive ancient freighter, Greek construction style - capable
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Possible05.jpg - Europa's largest ship's boat, for transport between ship and harbour or beach - maybe just capable

Impossible Ship Types
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible01.jpg - Quadriremis, Battle of Actium, Egyptian - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible02.jpg - Triremis, Republic era - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible03.jpg - Triremis, Battle of Actium - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible04.jpg - West Roman Triremis Vehiculum, Dromon, 530 AD - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible05.jpg - Liburna, Biremis, battle of Actium - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible06.jpg - Enneris, imperial time - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible07.jpg - Octeris, Karthago era - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible08.jpg - Hmm!
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible09.jpg - Triremis, Battle of Actium - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible11.jpg - Triremis, Republic era (same as I.02, sorry) - Crew too large for food storage, open sides
http://Navis.TerraRomana.org/v/Prom/Impossible12.jpg - Provincial-Roman, North Africa (Tunisia), Imperial time - just "a little bit" too small

They look bigger than they were, remember, humans were a bit smaller than today. The largest ships were around 110 meters, usually however around 50 to 60 meters. And even those were already big. There were many, many more smaller ones. Look at I.12, there's a tiny cosy one... ;-) )