Carrack

Columbus' ships (G.A. Closs, 1892): The Santa Maria and the Niña are shown as carracks, to the left the caravel Pinta

A carrack or nau was a three- or four-masted sailing ship developed for use in the Atlantic Ocean in the 15th century by the Portuguese. It had a high rounded stern with an aftcastle and a forecastle and bowsprit at the stem. It was square-rigged on the foremast and mainmast and lateen-rigged on the mizzenmast.

Carracks were ocean-going ships: large enough to be stable in heavy seas, and roomy enough to carry provisions for long voyages. They were the ships in which the Portuguese and the Spanish explored the world in the 15th and 16th centuries. In Portuguese this type was called nau, while in Spanish it is called carraca or nao (both of which meant simply "ship"). In French it was caraque, caravelle or nef.

As the forerunner of the great ships of the age of sail, the carrack was one of the most influential ship designs in history.^{[citation needed]}

Early origins

By the late Middle ages the cog and cog-like square-rigged vessels, were widely used along the coasts of Europe, in the Baltic, and also in the Mediterranean. Given the conditions of the Mediterrenean, but not exclusively restricted to it, galley type vessels were extensively used there, as were various two masted vessels, including the caravels with their lateen sails. These and similar ship types were familiar to Portuguese navigators and shipwrights. As the Portuguese gradually extended their explorations and trade ever further south along Africa's Atlantic coast during the 15th century they needed a larger and more advanced ship for their long oceanic adventures. Gradually, they developed the carrack from a fusion and modification of aspects of the ship types they knew operating in both the Atlantic and Mediterranean and a new, more advanced form of sail rigging that allowed much improved sailing characteristics in the heavy winds and waves of the Atlantic ocean.

A typical three-masted carrack such as the São Gabriel had six sails, namely bowsprit, foresail, mizzen, spritsail, and two topsails.

Carracks in Asia

From around 1515, Portugal had trade exchanges with Goa in India, consisting of 3 to 4 carracks leaving Lisbon with silver to purchase cotton and spices in India. Out of these, only one carrack went on to China in order to purchase silk, also in exchange for Portuguese silver.

From the time of the acquisition of Macau in 1557, and their formal recognition as trade partners by the Chinese, the Portuguese Crown started to regulate trade to Japan, by selling to the highest bidder the annual "Captaincy" to Japan, in effect conferring exclusive trading rights for a single carrack bound for Japan every year. That trade continued with few interruptions until 1638, when it was prohibited on the grounds that the ships were smuggling priests into Japan.

Further development

By the end of the 16th century the carrack had been further developed into the galleon. The hull was elongated, the forecastle lowered and set backwards to present less resistance to the wind, and the stern streamlined. These changes increased speed and allowed the vessel to go higher against the wind. Carracks, however, continued to be used well into the 17th century.

Famous carracks

• Santa María — in which Christopher Columbus made his first voyage to America in 1492.
• São Gabriel - commanded by Vasco da Gama in the 1497 Portuguese expedition from Europe to India by circumnavigating Africa.
• Frol de la mar - over nine years served in the Indian Ocean, sinking in 1512 with Afonso de Albuquerque after the conquest of Malacca with a huge booty, making it one of the mythical lost treasures.
• Victoria — the first ship in history to circumnavigate the globe (1519 to 1522), and the only survivor of the Spanish expedition.
• La Dauphine - Verrazzano's ship to explore the Atlantic coast of North America in 1524.
• Santo António — or St. Anthony, the personal property of King John of Portugal, wrecked off Gunwalloe Bay in 1527, the salvage of whose cargo almost led to a war between England and Portugal.
• Great Michael — a Scottish ship, at one time the largest in Europe.
• Mary Rose, Henri Grâce à Dieu and Peter Pomegranate — built during the reign of Henry VIII - English military carracks like these were often called great ships.
• Grace Dieu — commissioned by Henry V
• Santa Catarina Do Monte Sinai — war ship built in India by the Portuguese
• Santa Anna — a particularly modern design commissioned by the Knights Hospitaller in 1522 and sometimes hailed as the first armoured ship.
• Madre de Deus — which was seized by the Royal Navy off Flores Island in 1592 with an enormously valuable cargo.
• Santa Catarina — which was seized by the Dutch East India Company off Singapore in 1603.
• Futtle Rozack—transported the first shipment of Indentured Indians to the colony of Trinidad. Landed in Port of Spain on May 30, 1845

See also

• Medieval ships

Additional reading

• Kirsch, Peter, The Galleon (1990), Conway Maritime Press, ISBN 0-85177-546-2

V Sankaran Nair,‘Kerala Coast:A Byway in History’, (Carrack: Word Lore).ISBN 978-81-906028-1-5

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

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• The Development of the Square-Rigged Ship: from the carrack to the full-rigger
• Computer modeling of a Portuguese carrack