The Athenian Trirreme: The History and Reconstruction of an Ancient Greek Warship

Shortly before the launch of the reconstructed Greek warship, Olympias, the first edition of The Athenian Trireme was published, providing historical and technical background to the reconstruction of the ship. Since then, five seasons of experimental trials have been conducted on the ship under oar and sail, and the lessons learned have been supplemented by new archaeological discoveries and by historical, scientific and physiological research over the past fifteen years. For this second edition, the text has been recast and a number of substantive changes have been made. In addition, there is an entirely new chapter that describes the trials of Olympias in detail, reports the performance figures, and outlines the changes desirable in any second reconstruction. There are nineteen new illustrations, including eleven photographs of Olympias at sea demonstrating features of the design that could be represented only by drawings in the first edition. "Shortly before the successful launch of Olympias, the reconstructed Greek warship, the first edition of The Athenian Trireme was published, providing historical and technical background to the reconstruction of the ship in a Greek shipyard. Since then, five seasons of experimental trials have been conducted on the ship under oar and sail, and the lessons learned have been supplemented by new archaeological discoveries and by historical, scientific and physiological research over the last fifteen years. For this second edition, the text has been recast and a number of substantive changes have been made in the light of the sea trials and new research. In addition, there is an entirely new chapter which describes the trials of Olympias in detail, reports the performance figures obtained, and outlines the changes which the authors would wish to incorporate into any second reconstruction. There are nineteen new illustrations, including eleven photographs of Olympias at sea demonstrating features of the design which could be represented only by drawings in the first edition."--Jacket

New edition of the technical and historical background to the reconstruction of a Greek warship.