Early Ships and Seafaring: European Water Transport

by Seán McGrail

Overview

Early Ships and Seafaring: Water Transport Within Europe builds on Professor Seán McGrail's 2006 volume Ancient Boats and Ships by delving deeper into the construction and use of boats and ships between the stone age and AD1500 in order to provide up to date information. Regions covered will include the Mediterranean and Atlantic Europe.

This interesting volume is easily accessible to those with little or no knowledge of the building and uses of boats, whether ancient or modern. Seán McGrail introduces the reader to this relatively new discipline through the theory and techniques used in the study of early boats as well as the many different types of evidence available to us, including archaeological, documentary, iconographic, experimental and ethnographic, and the natural, physical laws.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781399019453
Publisher:	Pen and Sword
Publication date:	02/08/2023
Pages:	208
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.20(h) x (d)

About the Author

Professor Seán McGrail served in the Royal Navy as a seaman officer from 1946 to 1968; from 1952 he flew as a pilot in the Fleet Air Arm. He graduated with a BA at the University of Bristol in 1971, and in 1978 gained a Ph.D. at University College, London with a thesis on The Logboats of England and Wales. In 1988 he was awarded a D.Sc. by the University of Oxford.

Professor McGrail was Chief Archaeologist at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich from 1974 to 1986, and Professor of Maritime Archaeology in the Institute of Archaeology, Oxford from 1986 to 1993. From 1993-2021 he has been Visiting Professor at the University of Southampton. He passed away in 2021.

Editorial Reviews

"This book covers the relatively new specialization of water transport in archaeology. It is a delightful and informative book that is illustrated throughout with single colour sketches and photographs. Water transport has been curiously under-covered, even though it was of vital importance to developing civilizations and continues to be important today. This is a book that should be widely read because it recounts the way in which water and water transport has shaped human development. Highly recommended."

Firetrench

"This is a short but invaluable book that ends with suggestions for future research."

Current Archaeology

"[An] excellent exposition."

UNRV

"[A] concise though well-informed look at what knowledge the relatively young field of nautical archaeology has amassed in relation to the water transport of early Europe… a useful introduction to the topic for the uninitiated, and a concise reference for the learned."

The Maritime History Podcast

"Early Ships and Seafaring is a very good book that ought to be widely read... In three sleek chapters, one on concepts and techniques, one on the Mediterranean and one on the Atlantic, McGrail outlines our knowledge base for European seafaring from prehistory to the end of the Middle Ages; he uses many good examples and offers useful cross references to ethnographic and experimental archaeological data."

Medieval Archaeology

…an ideal and highly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and university library Maritime History collections…

Midwest Book Review

"Archaeological evidence of boats and ships is unfortunately scare, but McGrail does an excellent job in this book of compiling what knowledge we do have from iconographic, documentary, ethnographic and archaeological sources."

Current World Archaeology

"As a qualified shipwright myself I particularly relate to the extensive and well chosen selection of diagrams and photographs of construction of such craft included in this book."

Julian Stockwin