The surface of the planet Earth is mostly covered by water, so it is seems fairly obvious that man, the dominant species of the planet, would at some point in its history begin to develop ways to traverse the rivers, lakes, seas and oceans that exist on Earth. The preferred method of travel across water is, of course, the ship. However, the huge oil tankers, passenger liners, and aircraft carriers that are so common now, in the beginning of the 21^st century, were not around at the beginning of the development of watercraft. This paper will attempt to trace the steps that the development of ships took throughout the history of water travel. I will discuss the first primitive forms of boats including dugouts, rafts, and hide boats. Then I will move on to Egypt and look at how the Egyptians developed travel on the Nile river. Also, I will look at Greek and Roman boats and how they were used in Warfare and in maintaining these two empires. Throughout the essay, I will show how ships played a major role in peoples lives and their cultures, and how ships directly influenced the societies and cultures which built them, since water travel represented a new way to move around the world, communicate across long distances, and wage war.

The very first way that humans were able to travel on the water was "not in boats but on whatever they could find that would keep them afloat."(1) People in both Mesopotamia and Egypt would use bundles of reeds tied together or logs to float along a body of water. Another early technique for staying afloat in the water was to swim "on inflated animal skins."(2) The limitations to these early forms of boats are that they only support one person and so boats would then have evolved "from the single log or bundle of reeds that would support one person to a platform that would support several."(3) These were the first rafts and they were often made of several logs lashed together if wood was available. A particularly interesting form of raft which developed from the inflated animal skin float was called the Kalakku, in Akkadian. These were made by fastening "from four to hundreds of skins together beneath a framework of poles to form a raft."(4) What was particularly special about these rafts was that if one or even several of the skins were damaged by rapids during a trip, the raft could stay afloat and the skins could easily be repaired later. Also, they could be "floated downriver and, after their cargoes were unloaded, dismantled and carried back upstream on donkeys,"(5) making them a very efficient way to move goods at a time when it was difficult to travel against the current of a river. In Egypt, we see the development of the reed raft because the Nile valley is not rich in trees, so people used reeds instead. These first Egyptian rafts were simple "bundles of reeds lashed together,"(6) which did not last very long, since the reeds would become waterlogged "in a matter of weeks, or at most, months."(7) At this point in time, sails were not in use, so boats were moved in other ways. The most obvious method of movement, was for the boat to drift alone in the current, however with this method, steering was difficult and return trip upstream were next to impossible, meaning that the boat had to be dismantled and carried back as seen above with the animal bladder rafts. So, early boats were most often moved through the water by "paddles and/or punting poles or were towed by humans or beasts from the riverbanks."(8)

"Along with rafts men created true boats, craft that would not only keep a user afloat but enable him to stay dry in the process."(9) These vessels, which we see develop in Mesopotamia and Egypt around the 4^th millenium B.C., were similar to the modern canoe, and there were several ways of making them. One type was known as the dugout, which was made from "a hollowed out trunk of a tree."(10) Another was called the skin boat, which was "made of sewn hides stretched over a light frame of branches and laced together with withes, cords, or thongs."(11) A third type of canoe like boat is the clay tub, which was made by shaping clay into the form of a canoe so that the user could sit inside it. Of the three types of canoe like boats, the dugout boat influenced the development of future craft the most, since the builders started to raise "the sides by adding planks and inserting frames to strengthen the complex."(12) This was the first step towards the planked boat, with the original dugout becoming the keel of the boat, the planks rising to become hull, and the inner frame becoming the ribs of the boat.

In Egypt, with the helpful prevailing wind and the Egyptians’ stone Architecture, which required them to move massive stones along the Nile river, we see the development of the first boats made entirely of planks. The Egyptian reed rafts, which were mentioned earlier briefly, had by the second half of the first millenium B.C., developed into reed boats. The Egyptians had transformed their rafts into boats by learning to "shape their rafts, making them long and slender and bringing them to a point at each end and [learning] to direct them with steering oars slung on the quarters."(13) The Egyptians began to develop a stone architecture by about 2700 B.C. meaning that "some form of cargo vessel was needed to ferry massive blocks of rock from the quarries to the building sites."(14) At this point in time, the Egyptians created the first plank boats, using wood, called acacia, that could "only be obtained in short pieces."(15) These plank boats were constructed with the planks being put together first, then the inner framework added afterwards to strengthen the hull of planks. Since the planks were built with no framework in place, the planks had to be fastened together "by means of pegs, joints, staples, mails, or by sewing them together with twine,"(16) and the seams were also caulked with papyrus. Furthermore, the Egyptian boat builders added crossbeams at the top of the plank sides to support a deck and to "[provide] lateral stiffness, [and keep] the sides from sagging."(17) Plank boats also developed in Mesopotamia at a later date and here the technique of sewing the planks together did not exist, instead "the planks were fastened edge to edge by mortise-and-tenon joints."(18) Another difference that arose between Egyptian ships and Mesopotamian ships was the use of sails. In Egypt "the prevailing North wind led to the development […] of sailboats that could sail upstream, against the current, and then return easily downriver."(19) While in Mesopotamia the prevailing wind and the river current were both in the same direction, "which meant that towing was the only way to get boats upstream."(20) The idea of "using the wind instead of muscle for driving a boat"(21) would change the way that ships were built in the future.

The Egyptians were now advanced enough in their shipbuilding skills that they were able to venture beyond the Nile river. A painting from around 2450 B.C. depicts "the return of an overseas military expedition"(22) and "it is believed that the Egyptians sailed out over the Mediterranean to Syria and Greece before 3000 B.C."(23) At this point in the development of ships, "in the absence of navigational devices, the ships were restricted to moving on rivers, along coasts, or in narrow seas."(24) The Egyptians were now able to build boats that were "equipped only to be rowed or poled or towed, others carried sail as well, or only sail."(25) The rowers in these Egyptian ships sat one to each oar, in two lines along the boat. The idea of having both rowers and a sail became a very common feature in the boats of other peoples which cam after the Egyptians. One thing that the Egyptians lacked in their ship designs was the idea of a keel, instead "a strong rope had been stretched over a series of props from bow to stern,"(26) to serve the keel’s function of strengthening the hull of the ship. The idea of keel also becomes important later when the Greeks and Romans began using ships as war machines, which rammed into other ships splintering their hulls.

The next important people in the development of sea craft are the Phoenicians, who "beginning about 1100 B.C., dominated the eastern Mediterranean for about three centuries."(27) The Phoenicians used sea travel throughout the Mediterranean area mainly as a way to facilitate trade and for them "the sea was the highway, the facilitator of exchange and communication."(28) The Phoenician merchant vessels were short and wide so that they could hold a lot of cargo, and they were "built up from a heavy keel with ribs,"(29) using one square sail and no rowers to move about the waters of the Mediterranean Sea. The idea of building a ship starting with the keel and ribs and then adding the planks actually originated in Crete around 2000 B.C. The people of Crete were "probably the first to differentiate between war craft and merchantmen,"(30) and along with the Phoenicians, their crafts influenced the Greeks when they began designing their war ships.

The Greeks early war ships were really like large dugouts, and had "a sharp yet sturdy ram [which was] an integral part of a sturdy, relatively light, easily propelled hull."(31) The major problem with the dugout model for a warship is that they offered very little protection to the oarsman who were exposed to attack from enemy archers. So, the Greeks began to build their warships from the keel and ribs as the Phoenicians had earlier, which allowed them to create first biremes, and then later triremes. A bireme is a ship which has rowers on two levels, and the rowers are under the deck of the ship, meaning they are much better protected, and that the deck "could carry a fighting contingent."(32) The triremes had three levels of rowers on them, with each rower pulling one oar and the first one was launched "sometime during the 7^th century B.C."(33) The reason for the increase in the levels of rowers was simply that more rowers meant that the ship could travel faster, which was very important since speed was essential when ramming an enemy vessel. Greek triremes also had "a single mast with a broad, rectangular sail"(34) which helped add speed and maneuverability to the ships. The rams on the Greek triremes were "usually shod in bronze [and] formed a forward prolongation that gained effectiveness from the heavy keel back of it"(35) and the ram "was at least two-pronged"(36) on the triremes, unlike the single pronged rams from the earlier biremes. A final advancement that is associated with the Greek triremes is that they were so light that they could "be drawn up by their crews on the beach at night [and] be portaged over considerable distances on rollers."(37) The Greeks did have one flaw in their ship building designs and that was that they used an "outrigger on which oarlocks were fixed,"(38) meaning that the oars were accessible to attack. If an enemy succeeded in destroying the majority of a warship’s oars, it became "a standing target for the mortal stroke of the ram."(39)

The Romans were the next naval power in the Mediterranean and although their ships differed little from those of the Greeks, they did make some minor changes that made them a formidable fighting force. The Romans, instead of using an outrigger to hold the oars, "placed the oars in ports pierced in the hull."(40) However, the Romans did not completely remove the outriggers, instead they turned it into a projecting wall which was designed so that "at the critical moment the rowers could swing the oars as close alongside the hull as possible, where, under the shelf of the projecting wall, they could not easily be reached."(41) The other major change the Romans brought was that each roman warship had "fitted in the bow a hinged gangplank with a grappling spike or hook in the forward end, thus providing a boarding ramp."(42) Thus the Roman warships changed how sea battles were fought. They carried "many more marines than warships usually did,"(43) and their tactic of ramming and then boarding won them many battles.

So, from their humble beginnings as inflated animal skins and piles of reeds, ships had developed into the primary war machine used by rulers to control empires. The steps along the journey that brought ships to be the primary method of long distance travel and communication were by no means arranged in a straight path. Each people that used ships, developed them differently depending on their needs and the materials available to them. The very first boats were built simply so that people were able to cross the rivers around where they lived with greater ease. Egyptians made boats out of reeds from the riverbanks of the Nile and the wood of the Acacia tree so that they could transport stone blocks to build such wonders as the pyramids. The Phoenicians built a trading empire with ships designed to ferry goods around to various parts of the known world. The Greeks and Romans waged wars with wooden ships that had rams attached to the front end and were powered by hundreds of rowers and often a sail. While people’s needs, available materials and circumstance ruled how ships developed, it is reasonable to assume that some kind of ship would have developed at some point in our history. With so much water on our planet it is impossible to imagine ourselves unable to travel on it, and now, in the 21^st century, we are able to cross the Oceans with as much ease as we travel on land.

(1)Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 3.
(2) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 11.
(3) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 3.
(4) George F. Bass, "Sea and River Craft in the Ancient Near East," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995) p. 1421.
(5) Eric M. Meyers (Editor), "Ships and Boats," The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaelogy in the Near East, Vol. 5, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1997) p. 30.
(6) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 11.
(7) George F. Bass, "Sea and River Craft in the Ancient Near East," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995) p. 1422.
(8) Eric M. Meyers (Editor), "Ships and Boats," The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaelogy in the Near East, Vol. 5, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1997) p. 30.
(9) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 5.
(10) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 11.
(11) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 5.
(12) Ibid., p. 8.
(13) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 11.
(14) Ibid., p. 13.
(15) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 22.
(16) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 16.
(17) Ibid., p. 15.
(18) Eric M. Meyers (Editor), "Ships and Boats," The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaelogy in the Near East, Vol. 5, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1997) p. 30.
(19) George F. Bass, "Sea and River Craft in the Ancient Near East," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995) p. 1423.
(20) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 23.
(21) Ibid., p. 12.
(22) Ibid., p. 20.
(23) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 16.
(24) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "Transportation," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 28, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 759.
(25) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 18.
(26) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 18.
(27) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "War, Technology of," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 29, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 589.
(28) D. T. Potts, "Distant Shores: Ancient Near Eastern Trade," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995) p. 1462.
(29) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "Transportation," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 28, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 759.
(30) Ibid., p. 759.
(31) Björn Landström, The Ship: An Illustrated History, (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961) p. 28.
(32) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 81.
(33) Ibid., p. 81.
(34) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "War, Technology of," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 29, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 590.
(35) Ibid., p. 590.
(36) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 85.
(37) Ibid., p. 89.
(38) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "Transportation," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 28, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 758.
(39) Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World, (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971) p. 145.
(40) Ibid., p. 143.
(41) Ibid., p. 145.
(42) Philip W. Goetz (Editor), "War, Technology of," The New Encyclop³dia Britannica, Vol. 29, (Encyclop³dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991) p. 590.
(43) Ibid., p. 590.

Bass, George F., "Sea and River Craft in the Ancient Near East," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, pp. 1421-1431, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995).

Casson, Lionel, Ships and Seamanship in the Ancient World (Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1971).

Goetz, Philip W.(Editor), "Transportation," The New Encyclop³ dia Britannica, Vol. 28, pp. 752-865, (Encyclop³ dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991).

Goetz, Philip W.(Editor), "War, Technology of," The New Encyclop³ dia Britannica, Vol. 29, pp. 529-627, (Encyclop³ dia Britannica, Inc., Chicago, 1991).

Landström, Björn, The Ship: An Illustrated History (Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1961).

Meyers, Eric M.(Editor), "Ships and Boats," The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaelogy in the Near East, Vol. 5, pp. 30- 34, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1997).

Potts, D. T., "Distant Shores: Ancient Near Eastern Trade," Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Ed. Jack M. Sasson, Vol. 3, pp. 1451-1463, ( Simon & Schuster Macmillon, New York, 1995).