WEBVTT - Ancient Oars on the Wine-Dark Sea, Part 1 0:00:03.080 --> 0:00:07.080 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.200 --> 0:00:15.040 Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. 0:00:15.160 --> 0:00:18.680 My name is Robert Rant and I am Joe McCormick. 0:00:18.720 --> 0:00:21.520 And today on Stuff to Blow Your Mind, we are 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:24.759 going to be kicking off a series looking at paddles 0:00:24.880 --> 0:00:29.520 and oars, rowing and paddling the boats of the ancient world. 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:32.440 Rob So you pick this topic out. What got you 0:00:32.440 --> 0:00:33.760 thinking about paddles and oars? 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:37.200 Well, I was kind of hungry for another dip into 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:41.080 the invention style episode that we frequently come back to. 0:00:41.600 --> 0:00:45.040 You know, something that talks about generally or as often 0:00:45.080 --> 0:00:47.440 as the case, you know, some sort of ancient technology 0:00:47.479 --> 0:00:52.879 and how it comes about, and what what what leads 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:57.200 to these innovations, you know, what is the environment that 0:00:57.240 --> 0:01:00.000 they evolve in and so forth. And I started looking 0:01:00.040 --> 0:01:02.720 around of some of my usual primary sources and I 0:01:02.800 --> 0:01:05.480 was like, Oh, this looks like the perfect thing to 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:08.960 get into, like getting into the history of these ancient 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:15.600 Mediterranean or powered boats. In many cases we're dealing with warships, 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:18.840 but this would have also applied to varying degrees to 0:01:19.680 --> 0:01:23.280 various trade vessels as well. And it's one of those 0:01:23.280 --> 0:01:25.600 topics when you really get into it, like all these 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:32.960 different disciplines converge because there's archaeology, modern maritime archaeology, there 0:01:33.120 --> 0:01:37.080 is there's of course literary history. There are also all 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:41.959 these enduring mysteries and disagreements throughout the ages about how 0:01:41.959 --> 0:01:45.520 to interpret what has been passed down concerning these vessels. 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:49.880 Now with these ancient warships that were powered by many rowers, 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:51.920 you know, and we can talk as we go on 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:55.160 about the different designs there, the different numbers of levels 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:59.560 of rowers and things like that is part of the 0:01:59.600 --> 0:02:02.840 idea there that you would have these even in the 0:02:02.880 --> 0:02:05.639 case where it's a boat that could move under sail 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.079 power in some cases, but you would transition to ore 0:02:09.240 --> 0:02:13.440 power to increase like maneuverability and speed during a battle. 0:02:14.360 --> 0:02:16.200 Yeah. Yeah, this is a big part of it. Like 0:02:16.240 --> 0:02:18.480 you could you could certainly get by with just sails, 0:02:19.680 --> 0:02:22.880 but having the oars on hand meant that you could 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:26.520 absolutely have the power at your disposal when you needed it, 0:02:26.880 --> 0:02:30.919 especially if you're dealing with an environment where the winds 0:02:31.000 --> 0:02:34.120 might not cooperate with you. You can't necessarily count on 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:37.600 the winds to be there for that push to the shore. 0:02:37.680 --> 0:02:40.080 If you're doing some sort of like a marine landing, 0:02:40.560 --> 0:02:44.600 or you can't depend on the wind to help you 0:02:44.680 --> 0:02:47.760 outrun or chase down another vessel. But if you have 0:02:47.840 --> 0:02:50.840 your oars, well, then you're only limited by the amount 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:54.840 of skilled oarsmanship on board your vessel. And I think 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:56.920 that's an important That's one of the things that attracted 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:59.560 me to this too, because I feel like, speaking for myself, 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:02.480 I felt like growing up, I pretty much had a 0:03:02.480 --> 0:03:05.639 Scooby Doo level understanding of what it meant to have 0:03:06.320 --> 0:03:08.560 or power on a vessel. You know, sort of like 0:03:08.880 --> 0:03:12.480 thinking about maybe not Scooby Doo in particular, but various 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:16.079 fictions in which people were captured by you know, some 0:03:16.120 --> 0:03:18.800 sort of nefarious enemy thrown into the hold of the 0:03:18.840 --> 0:03:23.320 ship where they have to pull the oars, and you know, 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:25.560 the idea here is like, oh, and we can easily, 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:27.800 you know, imagine ourselves in that scenario like oh, I 0:03:27.800 --> 0:03:29.560 don't know how to pull an or mean, I've never 0:03:29.560 --> 0:03:31.600 done this before, but now someone's going to whip me 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:32.880 if I don't, Well, why. 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:35.640 Was that Scooby Doo? Does this happen in Scooby Doo? 0:03:35.800 --> 0:03:37.160 I don't know if it happened in Scooby Doo, but 0:03:37.360 --> 0:03:42.040 it may have happened in something consumed in that general area. 0:03:42.080 --> 0:03:44.520 You know, it probably happened on some of these old cartoons. 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:46.440 Or Scooby and Shaggy would not be good at rowing. 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:51.720 But whatever you're imagining was Scooby Doo and Shaggy thrown 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:54.480 into the into a ship and made to pull an oar. 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:56.400 Like that's kind of like where my head used to 0:03:56.400 --> 0:03:58.760 be concerning this. But when you get into it, especially 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:02.080 in the ancient world, you're not dealing with a bunch 0:04:02.120 --> 0:04:07.480 of like forced amateur oarsmen down there. You're dealing with 0:04:08.160 --> 0:04:13.560 trained oorsmen. And it also non specialized doorsmen. Like it 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:15.760 might be very good, but this is not the only 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:18.000 thing they're going to be called on to do, so, 0:04:18.480 --> 0:04:20.000 you know. Suffice to say, I feel like it's a 0:04:20.040 --> 0:04:23.920 topic where I had a lot of long standing bits 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:27.080 of misinformation in my head, you know, and just assumptions 0:04:27.160 --> 0:04:30.040 about what this world consisted of, and when you get 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:31.880 into the details, when you get into what is known 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:33.960 and even what was written about in the ancient world, 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:37.159 it's a far more complex scenario. Yeah. 0:04:37.200 --> 0:04:39.520 I like it when we can learn everything we assumed 0:04:39.600 --> 0:04:40.040 was wrong. 0:04:40.400 --> 0:04:43.680 Yeah, now, I thought an interesting place to kick this 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:46.120 off would be to sort of jump ahead and talk 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:52.400 about one of the more extreme and unsustainable examples of 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:55.960 the technology, sort of like looking at the spruce goose 0:04:56.040 --> 0:04:58.200 before we talk about airplanes in general. 0:04:58.520 --> 0:05:00.719 Well, look at the lineage by seeing what's one of 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:03.280 the most ridiculous places that can go right. 0:05:03.320 --> 0:05:05.760 And the place to start is, by all accounts, the 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:10.400 tessar Aranka terrace, which means forty road or simply forty. 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:15.520 This was an allegedly massive catamaran galley warship, an extreme 0:05:15.640 --> 0:05:20.640 example of a polyrem or mini ORed vessel, and this 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:23.520 was like you can look up pictures of what this 0:05:23.560 --> 0:05:25.800 may have looked like. There's a lot of guesswork and 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:31.679 analysis involved here, but think about like an ancient world 0:05:32.440 --> 0:05:35.960 aircraft carrier with oars, and you're kind of in the 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:36.960 right zone for this. 0:05:37.880 --> 0:05:40.520 The version I'm looking at has like more oars than 0:05:40.520 --> 0:05:42.680 you can count sticking out all the sides of it, 0:05:42.760 --> 0:05:45.920 and it's got what looks like a giant gramophone horn 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:47.600 on it. I don't know what that's for. 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:51.920 So this would have been the pride and joy of 0:05:52.279 --> 0:05:56.520 the ruler Ptolemy the fourth philopatter that means lover of 0:05:56.560 --> 0:05:59.000 his father, which I don't know. It sounds like if 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:02.240 that's your title, now I'm questioning your love for your 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:04.240 father because you're making such a big deal out of it. 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:09.160 But anyway, he was the fourth Ptolemaic pharaoh of Egypt. 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:12.440 A little background. I think we've touched on the Ptolemies 0:06:12.440 --> 0:06:14.600 on the show before, but the rule of the Ptolemies began 0:06:15.120 --> 0:06:19.480 in three oh five BCE after the collapse of the 0:06:19.480 --> 0:06:24.680 Macedonian rule established by Alexander the Great. When Alexander's expansive 0:06:24.720 --> 0:06:28.600 empire collapsed, his followers ended up competing with each other 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:32.200 for the fragmented remains of that empire, and his general 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:37.400 and companion, Ptolemy the First Solder or Ptolemy the Savior, 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:42.640 claimed the Egyptian territory, the Egyptian centered territory, and established 0:06:42.880 --> 0:06:47.320 the Ptolemaic kingdom there. So the Ptolemies would rule over 0:06:47.440 --> 0:06:51.880 Egypt as essentially a Hellenistic state for three centuries until 0:06:51.920 --> 0:06:55.080 the death of Cleopatra. That's when the Roman Empire conquered 0:06:55.120 --> 0:07:00.799 Egypt in thirty BCE. Historians often point to make Egypt 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:04.919 as the longest and final Egyptian dynasty. During their rule, 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:08.320 they faced constant threats. Like at the very beginning, there 0:07:08.320 --> 0:07:12.720 were the wars of the Diodechai. These were the successors 0:07:12.720 --> 0:07:15.920 of Alexander, again fighting for the scraps of that empire. 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:20.480 There were multiple wars with the Seleucid Empire and the 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:24.040 Kushite Empire to the south. There were rebellions in southern Egypt, 0:07:24.080 --> 0:07:28.240 and then, of course, finally the Roman Empire which conquered them. 0:07:28.400 --> 0:07:31.559 Now coming to Ptolemy, the fourth lover of his father, 0:07:32.040 --> 0:07:35.320 who he would have ruled two twenty one through two 0:07:35.320 --> 0:07:41.600 four BCE, generally held up as part of the dynasty's decline. 0:07:42.320 --> 0:07:45.960 Despite some successes in the Fourth Syrian War, it was 0:07:46.000 --> 0:07:49.200 a period of rebellion in the south of Egypt, and 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:52.760 he was often criticized as being far more concerned with luxury, 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:57.120 ceremony and the trappings of empire rather than the severe 0:07:57.160 --> 0:08:01.800 work required to prolong its era. But if nothing else, 0:08:02.280 --> 0:08:05.520 he by all accounts had a massive boat, and that 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:09.120 is where the Tesla ronca terras comes into play. Now. 0:08:09.160 --> 0:08:12.120 If he had a reputation for being being more concerned 0:08:12.200 --> 0:08:16.280 with luxury and ceremony than with practicality does the boat 0:08:16.360 --> 0:08:17.480 follow this design? 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:21.680 It seems like most of the sources I've looked at 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:25.160 argue that this is the case. That this was. I've 0:08:25.200 --> 0:08:27.080 seen some quibbles, and we'll get into some of this, 0:08:27.360 --> 0:08:29.760 but by and large, a lot of people are like, yeah, 0:08:29.800 --> 0:08:32.120 this is exactly the sort of vessel that someone more 0:08:32.160 --> 0:08:36.959 concerned with appearances and pomp would would want constructed, A 0:08:37.040 --> 0:08:42.520 massive vessel that is maybe not actually an operational war platform, 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:45.000 but just a way to show off how awesome you 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:47.720 are and could potentially be in battle, as long as 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:50.040 you don't think too hard about how the ship's going 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:52.520 to get around. Okay, let's hear about it, all right. 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:55.000 So I mentioned it has a lot of ores. Depending 0:08:55.000 --> 0:08:58.720 on how you try and reconstruct it on paper in 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:00.720 your head, you might have had more more than five 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:04.199 rows of ores. We'll get into the details of that, 0:09:04.240 --> 0:09:08.000 probably more in the next episode. But seven naval rams 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:12.679 and flat on top an enormous aircraft carrier style deck, 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:15.560 and this would have been used to carry or at 0:09:15.640 --> 0:09:19.640 least show off troops and or siege equipment. Now, to 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:22.240 be clear, we have no physical evidence of the Tessar 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:26.000 Raga teris. We have archaeological evidence of some very old 0:09:26.000 --> 0:09:28.680 boats and ships from around the world, and thanks to 0:09:28.720 --> 0:09:31.800 twentieth and twenty first century maritime archaeology and all of 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:35.360 its technological innovations, we actually know more than ever before. 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:39.640 I noticed that Michael Levinson had an article in The 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:44.520 New York Times from earlier this year get the point 0:09:44.520 --> 0:09:47.200 that it's a golden age for shipwreck discoveries. We're just 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:51.040 able to see what's down there, detect things, and then 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:54.200 analyze them in ways that we couldn't even do last century, 0:09:54.200 --> 0:09:58.000 and last century was a pivotal time for advancing our 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:01.719 understanding of what came before. Well, it's interesting to think 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:06.120 about because, on one hand, an operational wooden ship, as 0:10:06.120 --> 0:10:08.560 I've seen pointed out, is just in a perpetual state 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.360 of decay. I mean, that's why we have the concept 0:10:11.360 --> 0:10:16.120 of the ship of theseus. It's constantly rotting. Essentially, it wears, 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:19.920 it breaks, it requires upkeep and replacement, and if left 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:22.680 to the ravages of time, if conditions are not right, 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:26.360 the whole thing is lost. For instance, one of the 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:29.480 main culprits, it's often pointed out, is the shipworm, as 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:32.599 a simil pullock, a nautical archaeologist at Texas A and 0:10:32.720 --> 0:10:36.000 M University and College Station pointed out, and this is 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:39.080 who was citing a that GEO article from twenty fourteen 0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:42.480 titled five Shipwrecks Lost to Time that archaeologists would love 0:10:42.520 --> 0:10:46.320 to get their hands on by Jane J. Lee, which 0:10:46.480 --> 0:10:49.240 which does get into some ships from this time period. 0:10:49.240 --> 0:10:52.440 But basically the idea is that this is this worm 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:55.000 is a wood burrowing mollusc. We may have talked about 0:10:55.000 --> 0:10:57.520 it on the show. Before they can break down a 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:00.800 submerged wooden vessel apparently in as little as five years. 0:11:01.600 --> 0:11:05.000 But the main way that ancient ships survive are by 0:11:05.400 --> 0:11:09.199 winding up buried under sediment or buried under their own cargo, 0:11:09.760 --> 0:11:15.520 such as you know, a bunch of ceramic andphora, you know, 0:11:15.800 --> 0:11:20.600 basically earthenware containers that end up serving as man made 0:11:20.640 --> 0:11:24.560 sediment to preserve the portion of the hull underneath it. 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:31.080 If you've watched any documentaries about, you know, ancient Mediterranean shipwrecks, 0:11:31.440 --> 0:11:34.319 you've probably seen some footage like this where it looks like, oh, 0:11:34.440 --> 0:11:37.520 it looks like a bunch of urns on the bottom 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:39.640 of the ocean, and that's essentially what it is. But 0:11:39.679 --> 0:11:42.120 then what is underneath those urns, what else is preserved? 0:11:42.160 --> 0:11:45.079 And sometimes we can learn a lot from what remains beneath. 0:11:45.520 --> 0:11:48.079 And this is why harbors, rather than open ocean, are 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.160 often considered better hiding places for some of these ancient wrecks. 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:53.800 And there also may be factors related to just how 0:11:53.840 --> 0:11:56.439 many of these ships operated and so forth, and how 0:11:56.480 --> 0:12:00.000 they operated. But yeah, it's like it's one of these 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:03.080 these cases where, yeah, we have one particular giant vessel 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:06.160 that one's lost to history. But in terms of more 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:09.840 common vessels of this type, yeah, we do have examples 0:12:09.880 --> 0:12:12.360 of shipwrecks we've been able to find and learn from, 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:16.440 you know, especially in recent years. But as with the 0:12:16.480 --> 0:12:19.400 fossil record, you know, depending on what we have to 0:12:19.440 --> 0:12:21.600 depend on, has various holes in it. You know, we 0:12:21.679 --> 0:12:24.600 have physical evidence of ships, and then we also have 0:12:24.679 --> 0:12:27.920 the written word to turn to. But as Christopher E. 0:12:28.280 --> 0:12:33.520 Choffen discusses in the Tessaranka Terras reconsidered this is this 0:12:33.679 --> 0:12:37.199 was a nineteen ninety one through nineteen ninety three a 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:40.839 publication of Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies. Technical 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:44.960 information in these ancient texts is uncommon, so it's you'll 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:47.240 have mentions of ships, but you know how many times 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:50.240 do they stop to really roll out the details and 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:52.960 the stats for a given vessel. But I guess the 0:12:53.000 --> 0:12:56.319 thing about the about a ship this big is that 0:12:56.400 --> 0:13:00.600 there would be some descriptions, some stats. It's out there 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:03.720 since it is so novel. You know, it's kind of 0:13:03.760 --> 0:13:07.559 like if you look in like biblical texts, are you 0:13:07.640 --> 0:13:11.120 going to have this, you know, actual length and with 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:13.880 descriptions for a cart? Now probably not everyone knows what 0:13:13.920 --> 0:13:16.160 a card is the arc of the covenant, well, and 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:19.760 then you got might get some details right. So, concerning 0:13:19.800 --> 0:13:23.200 the Tessaranka terras, there are two main sources that are 0:13:23.280 --> 0:13:27.720 typically cited. One is a second century CE Greek source, 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:32.040 the writings of Athenaeus of Necratis. This is more than 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:34.640 two hundred years after the reign of Ptolemy. The fourth. 0:13:35.920 --> 0:13:38.640 Chaffin cites this one in his work, and among the 0:13:38.679 --> 0:13:42.920 details included are the following two hundred and eighty cubits 0:13:42.920 --> 0:13:45.120 in length, which, to understand this would be like four 0:13:45.200 --> 0:13:47.440 hundred and twenty feet or one hundred and thirty meters 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:51.760 a breadth of thirty eight cubits or fifty seven feet 0:13:51.920 --> 0:13:55.719 seventeen meters. I'm not sure if this is per catamaran 0:13:55.800 --> 0:14:02.880 hole seven naval rams. As we discussed proportions, breathtaking decorations. 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:07.560 This is all subjective. And then it's said to have 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:15.280 required four thousand oarsmen and four hundred sailors and officers. 0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:22.080 That alone is is incredible, if not unbelievable. And if 0:14:22.080 --> 0:14:25.400 it's said to carry two eight hundred and fifty. 0:14:25.160 --> 0:14:28.760 Marines, okay, and the marines would refer to like armed 0:14:28.760 --> 0:14:31.880 soldiers who were not involved in the piloting or powering 0:14:31.920 --> 0:14:33.800 of the vessel, so they could you know, if you 0:14:33.840 --> 0:14:36.560 made contact with another ship at sea or made a landing, 0:14:36.600 --> 0:14:39.280 they could disembark or board another vessel to attack. 0:14:40.080 --> 0:14:42.560 Yeh, pretty much now in terms of whether they were 0:14:43.000 --> 0:14:46.840 pulling the oars or not, as we'll get into maybe so. 0:14:47.440 --> 0:14:49.440 But then you look at these stats, it's like, okay, 0:14:49.520 --> 0:14:53.960 four thousand oarsmen. Even if every single marine was double 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:57.080 doing double duty and also pulling the oars, you still 0:14:57.160 --> 0:14:59.920 would and also throwing the four hundred sailors and officers, 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:03.760 You're still short by a lot. You still need hundreds 0:15:03.800 --> 0:15:06.680 and hundreds of additional oarsmen to power this thing. 0:15:07.200 --> 0:15:11.560 So do experts have an opinion of like whether this 0:15:11.640 --> 0:15:15.200 could be possible, whether this possibly existed as described, or 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:16.680 what's going on here? 0:15:17.200 --> 0:15:20.560 I mean it basically the big discussion comes down to 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:24.200 whether it was for show or operational, you know, like 0:15:26.760 --> 0:15:29.400 because another detail that is mentioned in this text is 0:15:29.440 --> 0:15:33.080 that it required this big specialized launching system in docks. 0:15:33.080 --> 0:15:35.400 So it was like so huge that it required something 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:37.880 new to be built in order to even you know, 0:15:38.320 --> 0:15:41.000 go up to it and use it to any limited 0:15:41.000 --> 0:15:44.960 degree in the water. But even still ancient authors were 0:15:45.000 --> 0:15:47.360 still skeptical about it as well, like for instance, another 0:15:47.400 --> 0:15:50.560 the other major description is a lot shorter, and it 0:15:50.600 --> 0:15:55.480 comes from Plutarch. He lived forty six through one nineteen CE, 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:59.120 and he repeats some of the exact same stats, but 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:02.280 also add that the ship was just for show and 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:06.640 could only be moved with great difficulty and danger. So 0:16:07.640 --> 0:16:10.400 he comments that it was not at all a practical warship, 0:16:10.640 --> 0:16:14.440 but a spectacle, certainly in keeping with the reputation of 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:19.400 Ptolemy the Fourth that has passed down through the centuries. Okay, now, 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:22.000 I guess you could get into a more nuanced discussion 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:26.480 about to what extent the spectacle is as useful or 0:16:26.480 --> 0:16:29.760 more useful than a functional vessel. I mean, I guess 0:16:29.800 --> 0:16:32.280 that's that's on the table. And then we have to 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:37.440 also take into account the reputation of ancient rulers as 0:16:37.800 --> 0:16:41.400 becomes kind of submitted in the in the historical record. 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:44.000 So you know, there's a there's a lot of back 0:16:44.040 --> 0:16:45.800 and forth to have there, But it sounds like there's 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:47.880 a strong case to be made that this was not 0:16:48.120 --> 0:16:50.480 very a very functional warship, that it was just about 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:54.280 showing off your military mind. But I think it's an 0:16:54.320 --> 0:16:58.080 interesting place to set out on our journey here. You know, 0:16:58.400 --> 0:17:01.360 looking at the Tessaranka tear is something that exists as 0:17:01.400 --> 0:17:06.159 the most outrageous and possibly grotesquely unrealistic example of an 0:17:06.160 --> 0:17:09.439 evolution of design in the ancient world. And I think 0:17:09.480 --> 0:17:11.760 this is especially interesting in light of how absolutely on 0:17:11.960 --> 0:17:15.240 point the engineering of the try Rem is considered to 0:17:15.280 --> 0:17:17.840 have been. I'm going to share a quote from Chaffin 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:19.960 on this that I referenced earlier. To be clear, this 0:17:20.080 --> 0:17:22.840 is he's not talking about the Tessaranga teris here. He's 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:27.840 talking about the more common and functional tri rem or 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.399 driven vessel. He writes it was a warship design at 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:35.840 the very limits of available technology, incapable of further development, 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:40.560 expensive to maintain, costly and trained manpower, and in the 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:44.040 long run too costly for the resources of the city state. 0:17:44.680 --> 0:17:46.719 So I think it seems reasonable to think of these 0:17:46.720 --> 0:17:48.919 almost as like jet fighters in the modern area, you know, 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:52.840 in terms of their upkeep and the technology involved, and 0:17:53.160 --> 0:18:06.359 just how expensive they are to maintain and use. So 0:18:06.400 --> 0:18:08.560 we're going to come back around to these, We're going 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:11.200 to come back around to the Tasaronkataris, We're going to 0:18:11.240 --> 0:18:13.520 come back around to the Trireme, and they sort of 0:18:13.960 --> 0:18:18.159 pinnacle of this technology as it develops in the ancient world. 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:20.880 But before we get into that, we need to talk 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:26.560 more basically about oars and paddles and other related technologies 0:18:26.560 --> 0:18:30.840 that are the basis for all of this. So I 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.600 guess to kick off here just a discussion of some 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:36.920 of the basic terminology that is used here. I was 0:18:36.960 --> 0:18:41.159 looking at the chapter in the seventy Great Inventions of 0:18:41.200 --> 0:18:45.720 the Ancient World by Brian M. Fagan, and the chapter 0:18:45.840 --> 0:18:48.359 that deals one of the chapters that deals with boats 0:18:48.760 --> 0:18:52.760 has Sean mcgrail on there as the co author who 0:18:52.880 --> 0:18:55.800 wrote the book Boats of the world. It covers the 0:18:55.800 --> 0:19:00.760 basics of paddles, polls, and ores. So polling involves the 0:19:00.880 --> 0:19:04.760 use of a long pole or setting pole, sometimes forked 0:19:04.800 --> 0:19:07.480 at the end, to push a small craft along by 0:19:07.520 --> 0:19:09.760 pushing it against the bottom of a body of water. 0:19:10.359 --> 0:19:13.040 And of note, this is a technology that may leave 0:19:13.160 --> 0:19:16.600 no trace on the vessel itself, like it's you know, 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:19.760 you can imagine it. You've probably seen some version of this, 0:19:20.080 --> 0:19:21.840 you know, in the world around you, because it is 0:19:21.880 --> 0:19:24.960 still used to this day. You know, it's just somebody 0:19:25.400 --> 0:19:26.159 poling along. 0:19:26.720 --> 0:19:30.359 Because they're especially useful in very shallow bodies of water 0:19:31.040 --> 0:19:33.600 and shallow channels. You might often see them paired with 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:35.560 a kind of boat called a punt, which is a 0:19:35.560 --> 0:19:39.760 more square shaped, flat bottomed boat that goes less deeply 0:19:39.800 --> 0:19:43.119 into the water. So yeah, you'll see people out on 0:19:43.320 --> 0:19:46.760 you know, shallow reams and streams and rivers, punting out 0:19:46.800 --> 0:19:48.960 on a kind of flat bottom boat, pushing along the 0:19:48.960 --> 0:19:49.800 bottom of the pole. 0:19:50.119 --> 0:19:52.879 Yeah, yeah, you see, you see these out in the 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:55.720 world for sure. And then of course there are paddles. 0:19:56.680 --> 0:19:59.919 Use of a paddle generally doesn't leave any evidence on 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:05.480 craft itself either, And then you have ores. Ores require 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:10.199 a pivot and possibly other specialized fittings, something that often 0:20:10.240 --> 0:20:14.760 will leave evidence on a vessel, though you know, should 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:17.200 enough of that vessel survive and I guess, depending on 0:20:17.240 --> 0:20:19.119 the materials used, you could also have like some of 0:20:19.160 --> 0:20:20.840 these fittings alone survive. 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:26.000 Yeah, so yes, to pick up on that. This is 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:28.560 a distinction that I did not fully have in my 0:20:28.680 --> 0:20:32.159 mind before researching for this episode. But there is a 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:34.960 difference between a paddle and an ore. I would have 0:20:35.000 --> 0:20:39.520 previously used these words interchangeably. But a paddle is a 0:20:40.320 --> 0:20:44.080 bladed beam that is held freely in the hands. And 0:20:44.119 --> 0:20:46.119 you might have a blade just on one end you 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:48.280 paddle on one side of the boat, or you might 0:20:48.320 --> 0:20:50.600 have a double sided paddle with two different blades, and 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:52.960 you can alternate which side, like you might use in 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:55.879 a kayak or something. So the paddle is held freely 0:20:55.880 --> 0:20:59.439 in the hands, while an ore is mounted to the 0:20:59.520 --> 0:21:02.440 boat in some way through a lock or a pin, 0:21:02.960 --> 0:21:06.119 sometimes called an ore lock, though that is a false 0:21:06.200 --> 0:21:09.200 cognate with the name or lock, as in count or lock. 0:21:09.280 --> 0:21:15.040 It is skilled differently thoar locked. Okay, And as with 0:21:15.119 --> 0:21:18.160 the different names of these devices, the verb is different 0:21:18.200 --> 0:21:20.360 as well, so Pushing through the water with a paddle 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:23.240 is called paddling. Pushing through the water with an ore 0:21:23.400 --> 0:21:27.359 is called rowing. That's what rowing is. Now. If you 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:31.359 have no experience with canoes or row boats yourself, you 0:21:31.760 --> 0:21:34.800 might not think of this. But there's a difference in 0:21:34.920 --> 0:21:39.000 the orientation of the operator with these two different ways 0:21:39.000 --> 0:21:42.760 of pushing through the water with bladed sticks. A person 0:21:42.880 --> 0:21:46.480 operating a free hand paddle is usually facing the same 0:21:46.600 --> 0:21:50.760 direction they're traveling, while a person rowing with a locked 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:54.680 or is usually facing away from their direction of travel. 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:58.200 So a canoe you're looking ahead, a row boat you're 0:21:58.240 --> 0:21:59.119 looking behind. 0:21:59.680 --> 0:22:03.280 You know, it's interesting that I've done both of these before, 0:22:04.040 --> 0:22:07.119 only a little bit of rowboat usage, mostly like canoe 0:22:07.160 --> 0:22:13.080 stuff packing. But my mind instantly goes to how these 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:17.359 translate differently in cinematic usage. You know, like if you 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:20.800 have someone in a row boat and you want their face, 0:22:20.880 --> 0:22:25.240 you want their emotions, their facial expression in the picture, 0:22:25.720 --> 0:22:29.320 then you are focusing, you're looking at the rear of 0:22:29.359 --> 0:22:32.359 the vessel and you're seeing them move away from the camera, 0:22:32.480 --> 0:22:34.679 Whereas if you're going you want the same effect more 0:22:34.760 --> 0:22:36.840 or less with someone in a canoe, where you're going 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.280 to have to have them coming towards the camera. So 0:22:39.640 --> 0:22:41.800 I don't know, you could probably get into a into 0:22:41.840 --> 0:22:45.760 a into a big, you know, cinematic discussion about how 0:22:45.920 --> 0:22:49.080 the different technologies transfer differently to the screen and what 0:22:49.119 --> 0:22:51.040 they say about the characters and their journeys. 0:22:51.400 --> 0:22:53.720 Yeah, that's interesting, you know. For some reason, I tend 0:22:53.720 --> 0:22:56.440 to think of when you have a shot of somebody 0:22:57.320 --> 0:23:01.360 powering a rowboat with oars with in oarlocks, so they're 0:23:01.400 --> 0:23:04.399 facing towards the stern of the boat. They're usually talking 0:23:04.440 --> 0:23:08.000 to somebody, aren't they Usually there's somebody sitting facing forward 0:23:08.040 --> 0:23:11.760 opposite them, sitting behind them, talking to them, and it seems. 0:23:11.440 --> 0:23:15.639 Like that, yeah, or they're like a lonely individual like 0:23:15.800 --> 0:23:18.679 rowing away from the shore where our point of view is, 0:23:19.240 --> 0:23:21.480