The Heyday of Sail: The Merchant Sailing Ship 1650-1830 (Conway's History of the Ship)

The Heyday of The Merchant Sailing Ship 1650-1830By the middle of the seventeenth century, a recognizable division had arisen between ships built for war and those intended for trade. Although many merchant vessels, like East Indiamen, continued to make useful naval auxilaries in times of conflict, this division was a highly significant step for ship design, and between this final divergence of warship and merchantman circa 1650 and the triumph of steam from 1830 onwards, there were no comparable revolutions in ship design. Nevertheless, the merchant sailing ship was subject to almost continuous improvement and diversification, in both hull form and rig, and the result was an ever expanding spectrum of local types and specialized variants.Taking this variety as its central them, The Heyday of Sail departs somewhat from the pattern of the Conway series to concentrate on developments at regional and local levels, emphasizing the influence of trading conditions on the history of each type of ship. Despite the importance of the subject - the prime vehicle of European economic and colonial expansion - this is the first book to sttempt a detailed survey of the merchant sailing vessel in its heyday.Lavishly illustrated, this informative title includes over 165 drawings, 25 black-and-white photos and over 20 tables and graphs. A must read for anyone interested in the history of shipping and ship design.