Indiaman

An Indiaman was a large armed merchant sailing ship operated by a chartered East India Company on the long Europe-to-Asia trade, in service from the 17th to the mid-19th century. The British, Dutch (VOC), Danish, and French companies all built them. A British East Indiaman of the Napoleonic era ran 1,000 to 1,500 tons, carried 30 to 40 guns, and looked like a small ship of the line; its high cost and slow passage left it open to the faster clipper after 1840.