Ropes And Pulleys
by D Hackett
Title
Ropes And Pulleys
Artist
D Hackett
Medium
Photograph - Digital
Description
Ropes And Pulleys by D Hackett
The Niña is a replica of the ship on which Columbus sailed across the Atlantic on his three voyages of discovery to the new world beginning in 1492. Columbus sailed the tiny ship over 25,000 miles. That ship was last heard of in 1501, but the new Niña has a different mission. We are a floating museum, and we visit ports all over the Western Hemisphere.
Deck length 65 ft
Beam ft
Draft – 7 ft
Tonnage 75
Sail Area 1919 sq ft
The ship is black because it is covered with pine tar, which is a water resistant.
In 1986, the Columbus Foundation was formed in the British Virgin Islands to raise money to build the three ships that Christopher Columbus used in his encounter with the New World. With the 500th Anniversary only six years away, it seemed like an opportune time to encourage interest in such a project. What was not known at the time that the quincentennial would turn out to be such a non-event. Some people saw nothing to celebrate. Instead, they thought that it should be an occasion to protest while pursuing modern political agendas.
The Columbus Foundation wasn't looking for heroes or villains. Theirs was a search for information. There were no authentic pictures of the Pinta, Niña or the Santa Maria, and all of the so-called models, replicas, or reproductions that had been built in the past merely represented what some artist, architect, archaeologist or model ship builder thought what they ought to have looked like.
The next two years were spent in research. During that time it became evident that due to money and time constraints it would be possible to build only one replica. It was decided that the Niña would be built. The original Santa Maria ran aground in Hispaniola and sank on the first voyage. She was a nao, or freighter and was built in Galicia. She became the flagship because she was the largest of the fleet but Columbus disliked her for her dull sailing qualities, and when she sank, he recorded in his journal she was very heavy, and not suitable for the business of discovery. The least was known about the Pinta, and after the first voyage she disappeared from history without a trace. The Niña, like the Pinta, was a caravel, which was a common trading vessel in use during the Age of Discovery.
Caravels were also used as cargo carriers, warships, patrol boats, and even corsairs (pirate ships). Their advantages were speed, a shallow draught, and manoeuvrability, plus the fact that they were good sailing ships. The Niña, which is rigged as a Caravela Redonda, has square sails on the main and foremast for sailing downwind, and lateen (triangular) sails on the mizzen masts.
The Columbus Foundation's aim is to educate the public on the type of ship, The Caravel, that Columbus used to discover a new world in the year 1492. Columbus made 4 voyages totaling 12 years on ships like these. We take great pride in displaying and maintaining the only traveling replicas in existence today.
In 1988, the Columbus Foundation hired John Patrick Sarsfield, an American engineer, maritime historian, and expert on Portuguese caravels, to design and construct a replica of the Niña. John had lived in Brazil while working in the Peace Corps, and had learned of an archaic ship building process called Mediterranean Whole Moulding. This was a technique used by master ship builders in the 15th Century and likely used to build the original ships. Sarsfield discovered this technique in daily use in shipyards on the coast of Bahia in Brazil. In a sleepy little fishing village called Valenca, Sarsfield slowly gained the confidence of the Valencan shipwrights and they began to share with him the secrets of their techniques. Valenca was chosen as the building site for three reasons: shipwrights were using Mediterranean Whole Moulding in conjunction with mechanically generated geometric progressions known as graminhos, techniques that may be similar or identical to those used by the builders of discovery period ships.
Secondly, shipwrights were using traditional tools, such as axes, adzes, hand saws and chisels, as well as utilizing traditional construction methods; and finally, the tropical forests of Bahia provided a source for the various naturally-shaped timbers necessary to build a large wooden ship.
Ships of this period were not built from a set of plans but from the mental template in the head of the shipwright who based the dimensions of the ship on a set of proportions. Different proportions, varying from region to region were used for different types, however, all were based on the length of the keel.
Several important design details, including such fundamental factors as the number of masts and rigging specifics were clarified by data from recent discoveries of 15th & 16th Century Spanish shipwrecks in the Caribbean.
Tragically, on July 11th, 1990, whilst on a trip to select a main mast for the Niña, John Sarsfield was killed in a traffic accident. His contribution to the project had been enormous, in fact, it was his determination to see his theories develop into reality that made the building of the NiÒa possible.
As the hull was complete, the ship had yet to be rigged. Jonathan Nance, British maritime historian, and one of the main researchers of the project, was asked to finish the ship. John produced a sail plan for the caravel together with numerous drawings of blocks, spars, and other fittings. Although no information directly relating to the design and construction of the Niña exists, specific reference to her rig and gear survives in a document called Libro de Armadas, which was discovered by Eugene Lyon. It indicated that the Niña may have been rigged as a four master. The document also included an inventory of equipment aboard the Niña in 1498 when a new Master Pedro Frances took over the ship. Nance's sail-plan represents the Niña as she would have appeared during the eight recorded busy years of her life following her departure from the Canaries in September 1492.
In June of 1990, the project came to the attention of a group of marine archaeological researchers from the privately-funded group Ships of Discovery, based in Corpus Christi, Texas. They spent a week inspecting the project and came away believing that they had seen the making of a true fifteenth century discovery caravel. Their article, published in the January 1991 issue of Archaeology magazine asserts: combining ethnographic survivals with pertinent results of documentary, artistic and archaeological research, Sarsfield's Niña will likely be the most authentic replica Columbus era ship ever built.
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April 11th, 2017
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