Marine navigation

Marine navigation is the art and science of steering a ship from a starting point (sailing) to a destination, efficiently and responsibly.

The ancient Egyptians did not limit themselves to inland navigation of the Nile either, and used the Mediterranean sea routes existing since the Neolithic — through which cultural phenomena such as megalithism or the metallurgy would have spread for millennia.

The Cretans even established a true thalassocracy (government of the seas, attributed to King Minos) until the Mycenaean period (2nd millennium BC), when the events mythologized in the Homeric poems[Note 1] ought to be placed.The Hittites, led by King Šuppiluliuma II faced the Cyprus in the first historically recorded naval battle (ca.

It is recorded that, crossing the Strait of Gibraltar — the "Rock of Gibraltar", the so-called "Pillars of Hercules" in the Greek myths — they sailed across the Atlantic Ocean reaching the south to some point on the west coast of Africa and the north to the British Isles (or even beyond, to the place that the texts call Thule), but it is unclear if they circumnavigated Africa or crossed the Atlantic reaching America, something most likely achieved by the Norsemen in the 10th century.

It has been proposed that they might have reached the South Atlantic and even America and Europe, but this proposal has not been accepted beyond mere speculation.Mediterranean navigation, which the Romans had come to control (undisputed Mare Nostrum since their victories over the Carthaginians in the Punic Wars [264-146 BC], the Egyptians during the Battle of Actium [31 BC], and pirates), was once again a contested environment in the Middle Ages, from the moment the Vandals managed to attack the Italian coasts from the sea.

Knowledge of the compass, transmitted to the Europeans by the Arabs (who in turn had obtained it from the Chinese), together with other improvements in astronomical techniques (astrolabe, Jacob's staff, sextant, cartographic techniques (portulan and shipbuilding (caravel, nau, galleon), made the Age of Discovery — initially led by the Portuguese and Castilians — possible, especially after Henry the Navigator impulsed the school of Sagres.

In 1488, Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope, which opened the route to the Indian Ocean — Vasco de Gama reached Calicut (India) in 1498.

Between 1519 and 1521, the Magellan-Elcano expedition circumnavigated the world — measuring the geographical longitude with the method of its scientific organizer, Rui Faleiro.

[9][10] The conjunction of "cannons and sails" has been argued to have given European states the advantage to prevail over the rest,[11] launching the modern "world system".

Even then, the unbridled optimism that characterized the naval design of the time suffered a severe blow with the sinking of the Titanic (1912).Contemporary shipping has massively ceased to perform one of its traditional functions and has been replaced by aviation, such as passenger transport, although with two important exceptions: leisure travel (tourism by cruise ships) and irregular traffic of people (irregular immigration).

by visual means (pelorus), observation of horizontal angles (sextant) or electronic methods (bearings from radar to racons, transponders, etc.)

At her feet, the ampoule, the compass, the trident of Neptune and the riches of commerce, while the sea can be seen on the horizon, completed by a lighthouse and traversed by ships at full sail.

Table of geography, hydrography and navigation, from the Cyclopaedia of 1728.
Boat depicted on Egyptian pottery from the Predynastic period (Naqada II, mid-4th millennium BC).
Khufu ship , IV dynasty, ca. 2500 BC.
Boat building depicted in reliefs from the Mastaba of Ti at Saqqara, dynasty V, mid-3rd millennium BC.
Egyptian boat represented in the tomb of Menna , Tombs of the Nobles , 18th dynasty, mid-2nd millennium BC.
Model of an Egyptian ship and crew.
Type of Phoenician ships called hippos (name given by the Greeks, because of its mascaron shaped like a horse's head) carrying wood, depicted in an Assyrian relief from Sargon's palace at Khorsabad .
King Luli of Sidon flees from his city, attacked by Sargon II , in a type of Phoenician warship called dieris ( bireme , with two rows of rowers). Assyrian relief from the palace of Sennacherib , ca. 700-692 BC.
One of the Phoenician vessels of Mazarrón , 7th century BC.
Dionysus Cup, by Exekias , 6th Century
Scene from the Odyssey (Ulysses' companions manage to free their ship from the Sirens' trap, while their leader listens to their song tied to the mast). 5th century.
Roman ship represented in a fresco of the 2nd or 3rd century in the port city of Ostia . The inscriptions reflect the name of the ship (Isis Giminiana), the name of the captain or magister (Farnaces, at the helm) and the name of the owner (Arascanius, in charge of the cargo). [ 4 ]
Roman sarcophagus from the 3rd century. It is the oldest representation of a spritsail .
Byzantine ships in Classe (the port of Ravenna ), depicted in a mosaic of Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo , 6th century.
Oseberg Ship , 9th century.
Norman ship represented in the Bayeux tapestry , 11th century.
Viking ships depicted in a 12th-century manuscript.
Nautical combat with Greek fire depicted in a 12th-century Byzantine manuscript ( Madrid Skylitzes ).
Scene of lamp fishing
Replica of a Spanish-Muslim ship from the 10th to 14th century.
Galley or dromon in a Byzantine fresco from the 13th century. The design of the flags is similar to the Senyera of the Crown of Aragon, and the design of the ship can be compared to the traditional mitjana ship.
The earliest known representation of a compass, used aboard ship, depicted in an illustration dated 1403.
Rhumb line navigation path: β = constant