Ships and Boats of Ancient Egypt

by Clive Oosthuizen

‘Egypt is the gift of the river’, said Herodotus, (5th Century BC) borrowing the words of an earlier visitor to Egypt.

The Nile provided, (and still does) a natural highway that unified Egypt. It is a friendly highway for sailors, it flows at an average speed of 1 knot in the spring and about 4 knots during flooding in summer. It is no surprise then that ships and boats developed quite rapidly, to fulfil the many needs of this developing culture.

Boats carried armies south into Sudan and north into the Middle East. They carried tax-collectors, officials, stone for monuments, grain, wine, cattle and other sources of food to the various markets. The Pharaoh, upon his death, would be transported to his final resting place by funerary bark. Small papyrus boats enabled men to fish and hunt and were simply used for pleasure and fun. In order to follow the development of their boats, it is easiest to divide it into the three main periods of Egyptian history.

The Old Kingdom
Until recently Khufu’s solar boat was considered the oldest. Discovered close to his pyramid, it was probably constructed between 2589 and 2566 BC. One has been excavated and assembled by Hag Ahmed Moustafa, Egyptian conservator. The parts were neatly stacked in thirteen layers, comprising 1224 pieces and after assembly the boat was found to be 43½ metres long, 6 metres in the beam and 1.8 metres broad at midships. It weighed 45 tons when assembled. The boat was probably used for funerary purposes, when Khufu’s mummy was transported to its final resting place from whence he would journey to his afterlife.

There has been endless debate about the seaworthiness of the boat. It was only after an accurate scale model was constructed, and subjected to simulated sea tests, that scholars agreed that it could not have had any other purpose.

Although it moves through the water with grace and hardly any wake, the ten oars could not possibly have propelled the ship. It was also found that the fore and aft structure would not be strong enough to support the weight above the water line. It was probably towed in a canal or moved on sleds or trailers drawn by oxen or men.

The Middle Kingdom
This period may be regarded as a transition in hull design and construction. The bi-pod mast disappeared and the designs of vessels from Greece and the Aegean began to have an influence.

While there are fewer pictorial representations in their art, large numbers of scale models have come down to us as well as the all important dockyard records of Sesostris I. When I visited the Cairo Museum I was able to examine one of the two ships, still in reasonable condition, found in a boat pit at the site of the Pyramid of Sesostris III. They are known as the Dahshur boats. Their construction indicates that they were perfectly seaworthy and may have been trading vessels preserved in memory of the Pharaoh.

The ships are round bottomed, broad in the beam and have gently curving sheers. Dimensions are approximately 10.2 metres long, 2.29 metres wide and nearly 1 metre deep. The traditional ‘Shell First’ method of construction was used.

It was built up around a keel plank of three sections of wood joined together with mortise-and-tenon joints, 3cm deep and 3 cm wide. The longest plank is 4.2 metres long and 3.5 cm wide at its widest point. The strakes are made of short pieces of wood (probably cedar) joined on the edges with mortise-and-tenon joints and shallow dovetail cramps inset from the inside.

The gunwales are made of sections lashed together at their ends and fastened to the uppermost strake by mortise-and-tenon joints. There is no internal stitching and no strengthening frames inserted into the hull. Lateral strength is provided by several cross beams resting in notches in the uppermost strake. These are fixed to the hull planking by dowels which are secured by wooden pegs cut off flush to the outside of the hull. This procedure renders frames unnecessary.

Steering oars and supporting stanchions were also found but details of masts, rigging and sails have been lost.

Flinders Petrie discovered parts of boats at Lahun which confirmed that frames were now being used and also that the mortise-and-tenon joints were being strengthened. In general, the construction of ships improved and new ideas were introduced.

An unusually complete set of model boats was found in the tomb of Meket-Ra, an official in the court of Mentuhotep II. These models illustrate four types travelling boats, kitchen boats, yachts and papyrus fishing boats.

The travelling and the kitchen boats are of the same spoon’ shaped hull, slightly higher at the bow with a single steering oar astern. It seems that sails were made of linen, probably of a very heavy weave. His yachts differed slightly, the stern being slightly elevated and with two steering oars but otherwise conforming to the general construction of the time. Of course Egyptian designs and improvements also influenced trading ships of the lands surrounding them and the interchange of methods and ideas moved the developments into the next phase.

The New Kingdom
During this time Egypt became a power of great international importance. It dominated Syria, Palestine, the Hittites and had considerable trade with the Greeks, the Aegean Islands, as well as the east coast of Africa up to the Horn.

From the study of reliefs and other illustrations it would appear that Egypt may have started losing technological ground to her trading counterparts. Reliefs at several temples are of great importance. The first is Hatchepsut’s mortuary temple at Deir El-Bahri where her trading vessels are very well illustrated, including details of the cargo they carried, as well as near complete details of the rigging and decoration. There are also illustrations of huge barges which were used to transport stone and obelisks.

The temple at Medinet Habu illustrates a naval battle between Egypt and the Sea People which fills in the details of their fighting ships.  Another example of a typical New Kingdom ship can be seen in the tomb of Rekhmire at Thebes. He was a senior official during the rule of Amenhotep II. The sail is much broader, held by two long yards and the lower yard being secured by at least sixteen ropes which form the usual triangular shape, secured at the top of the mast. As with the Hatchepsut ships, these vessels were equipped with oars.  It must have been difficult to sail into the wind as it was near impossible to tack against the wind. When we consider Hatchepsut’s expeditions to the land of Punt, we can understand how difficult the return voyage must have been. Her ships were of a sleek design and not broad of beam like the Syrian ships illustrated in the tomb of Kenamun, the Mayor of Thebes in the reign of Amenhotep Ill.

Small improvements were made from time to time, the major of such improvements being a change in the furling of the sail. Brailing appears for the first time during the Amarna period. It works like the cords of a Venetian blind. Metal rings were sewn into the sail cloth; so by looping the brails over the yardarm, the sails could be furled more easily and the ropes secured on the deck.

As Egyptian power and independence eroded and foreign rulers from Kush, Assyria, Macedonia and Rome took control, Egypt relied more and more on foreign ships to use in their sea trade. It is not clear if they developed new methods of construction when later ships were built, although it seems that the centuries old methods remained in vogue. Herodotus recorded detailed descriptions of boat building, giving great attention to the methods of construction and the tools that were used.

As Egypt sank into the hands of foreign powers and her time of glory drew to its close, their ship building industry dwindled into almost nothing – a sad ending to such a mighty maritime nation whose culture still astounds modern engineers, architects, artists and mariners.

Late News
On October 31st 2000 a fleet of 14 vessels was discovered at Abydos dating from approximately 3000 BC. It was known that at least a dozen boat pits existed near the site of Khasekhemwy’s funerary enclosure, and that these boats had been placed there long before his enclosure was constructed. The ships are about 75 feet long, seven to ten feet wide with narrowing at the bow and stem. Planks were lashed together with rope, threaded through mortices. For caulking they used reeds, probably driven into the lateral joins. No frames were found and we can therefore assume that these ships were not very durable and needed constant attention, strengthening, and waterproofing. Once the types of timber used are identified, we will have an insight into trade relations and political interaction.

Ship construction, in the absence of a keel, yielded a major problem known as hogging, which happens when the bow and stern are not supported and begin to sag. Boat builders installed heavy longitudinal girders at deck level, three vertical cleft supports, fore midships and aft, and then ran a heavy rope cable from bow to stern which would be tensioned up as hogging set in.

The Egyptians always displayed very clever solutions to their problems and in the Sun Temple of Sahure a completely new ship design appears. It is a seagoing vessel, manned by fourteen rowers and three steersman. The single mast has been replaced by a bi-pod of a narrow v-shape which swivels backward and rests on a T-shaped stand at the stern. This arrangement spreads the strain of a single mast and simplifies stowage when travelling down river.  Whether boat builders used single or bi-pod masts, they employed the same method of hoisting and lowering sail. Sails were hung from yards that were hoisted and lowered by ropes called halyards. The single sail was held square by a lower yard the weight of which was supported by rope lifts that were secured to the mast creating the well-known triangular arrangement of ropes. The halyards and ropes to support the mast were usually tied off at the stern.

Transport boats were not as graceful, with blunt bows and sterns. Reliefs and paintings illustrate many different designs and sizes carrying all sorts of loads, and I have no doubt that some ships capsized due to overloading.