3^ 



Before Chrift 700. 



rnarine, added to their former naval fuperiority, mufl have thrown Into 

 their hands a temporary dominion of the Grecian feas. 



Aminocles, whofe name is immortalized as the builder of the new 

 fhips, was alfo employed by the Samians, for whom he built four veflels. 

 Eufebius [N°. 1255] feems alfo to fay, that the Athenians had fome of 

 his fhips. But it is obfcurely expreifed ; and the time is too early by 

 many years for the age of Aminocles, according to Thucydides. 



Moft of the maritime Grecian flates foon adopted the ufe of triremes; 

 and fucceeding ages varied and increafed the number of tires of oars, as 

 ambition, or as vanity, prompted, the rates of the vefTels being deno- 

 minated from the number of tires, as modern fhips of war are called 

 two-deckers, three-deckers, &c. from their tires of guns. 



It is proper to obferve, that Damaftes, an author contemporary with 

 Herodotus, [<?/>. PU>i. Hijl. nat. L. vii, c. 56] fiys, that biiemes (veflels 

 with two tires of oars) were ufed by the Erythrseans or Arabians : and 



crofs the ocean, was enabled to unite nautical 

 kiiowlege with acutcnefs of refcarch and great claf- 

 fical reading. He fuppofes, that the antient gal- 

 lies were very flat in the hottom, and that their 

 fides were raifed perpendicular to the height of 

 only three or four feet from the furface of the 

 water, above which they diverged with an angle 

 of about 45 degrees. Upon this fioping wall he 

 places the feats of the rowers, about two feet in 

 length, the rows or tires of them being raifed on- 

 ly about 15 inches in perpendicular height above 

 each other *, and the feats, as well as the row- 

 poits, being arranged in quincunx or checker-wife, 

 as the gun-ports of a modern firll-rate (liip. Thus 

 the upper tire of oars in a trin'mis is only about 

 30 inches, in a quadiiremis 45 inches, and in a 

 quinqufreniis 60 inches, in perpendicular hciglit 

 above the lower tire ; while the combination of 

 the quincunx arrangement and the oblique fide 

 gives eveiy rower perfect liberty to act, no one 

 being perpendicularly above his ncatell neighbour 

 in the tire below hin). Ijy thus applying a great- 

 er number of oars and the force of a greater num- 

 ber of men, than could poffibly aft in a vefl'el with 

 upright fides, they greatly increafed the velocity 

 or impetus, upon which in naval engagements they 

 placed their whole dependence for the fiiccefsful 

 performance of all their mantcuvrcs, and for bilg- 

 ing their enemy's veflels witli the iron or brafeu 

 rojlra affixed to the heads of their own. But it 

 mull be acknowleged, that the uppcrmutl oars in 

 gallics of above live rows, though valtly (hort of 

 the length ncceflary upon the fuppofition of the 



fides being perpendicular, were ftill too long to be 

 worked with much elfett by one man, (nor docs it 

 appear that they ever employed more than onef ) 

 and tiiat the angle they made with the water, be- 

 ing about 45 degrees, mull have produced an ef- 

 fect fomewhat between rowing and paddling, as 

 thefe terms are undcrltood by our modern feamen. 



General Melville's ingenious difcovery is not on- 

 ly clear of all the difficulties attending the other 

 hypothefes, but it alio illuftrates, and is illuflrated 

 by, many paffages in antient writers, which are 

 otherways inexplicable. It is further confirmed by 

 antient fculptures at Rome, by a medallion of Gor- 

 dian at Naples, and by antient paintings at Portici, 

 fome of which, prelenting to view the ends of the 

 gallies, exhibit their floping fides with the oars 

 iffuing from them in exacl correfpondence with the 

 general's idea. 



For the mofl valuable part of this note I am 

 indebted to the polite and liberal communications 

 of General Melville ; who for illuftrating the prin- 

 ciples, on which the gallies were conftruiSled, has 

 a model of tlie fifth part of the walle of a qu'tn- 

 qutiemis, which is a rcduiftion, on the fcale of a- 

 bout one inch to a foot, from one of the full lize, 

 formerly erected in the back-yard of his houfe in 

 Great Pulteiiey ftrect, whereon many gentlemen of 

 clafiical and nautical knowlegc faw tlic thirty oars 

 (tiie fifth part of one hundred and fifty, which was 

 tiic number of oars on one fide) atlualiy worked 

 by thirty men, free of every impediment or inter- 

 ference, which might be apprehended from their 

 crowded pofitioa. 



• If we could depend on the text of OroCui, [L. v, r. 

 19] where he fay«, that Antony'n largeft drips, many of 

 which vcrc, nccordiiig to Moruh» of nine tires, l>tit accord- 

 ing 10 Dion CafTius ol ten tirei of oars, were only Iciifeet 

 altwe the ivater^ we Tiuft believe, that the lircs could not 

 he more than eight or nine inchci above each oibcr in j'cr- 



pcndiciilar htiirht. But x feet muft fuixly lie an erroneous 

 reading fur xv or xx, the v or x bein;^ loil in tranlVribing. 

 f It 19 evident from the Taiitics of l.co \_c. 19] iluit there 

 was but one man to an oar in his vcfTcls, none of which, it 

 is true, feem to luve had more than two tires of oars. 

 4 



