Galley

The galley was the oared warship of the Mediterranean from antiquity into the seventeenth century, propelled mainly by banked rowers with auxiliary sails. From the Greek trireme and Roman quinquereme through the medieval and Renaissance war galleys of Venice, Genoa, Spain, and the Ottomans, the type favored ramming, boarding, and a heavy bow gun in later centuries. Galleys excelled in the calm, coastal Mediterranean but were vulnerable to broadside sailing warships, which displaced them after Lepanto in 1571.