Human, Cultural, Historical and Reference

Maritime History glossary

The long arc of human activity at sea as an academic discipline: the age of sail, the transition from sail to steam, the reciprocating and turbine ocean-liner eras, the containerization revolution from the 1950s, and the historic specialized trades (clipper, grain, coal, ore). Includes exploration voyages, the development of navigation and the marine chronometer, wartime shipping and Liberty-ship production, and famous disasters studied as a recurring theme.

260 defined terms.

Showing 250 on this page (page 1 of 2).

A

Age of Discovery: European maritime expansion roughly 1418 to 1620, opening sea routes to Africa, Asia, and the Americas.
Age of Exploration: Synonym for the Age of Discovery, emphasizing voyages of Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, English, and French navigators.
Age of Sail: Period roughly 1571 to 1862 when sailing warships and merchantmen dominated global trade and naval warfare.
Akkadian Sea Trade: Bronze Age commerce between Mesopotamia, Dilmun, Magan, and Meluhha documented in cuneiform tablets.
Anchor watch: Watch maintained on anchored vessel.
Anson's Voyage: 1740 to 1744 circumnavigation by Commodore George Anson, notable for capturing the Manila galleon Nuestra Senora de Covadonga.
Argo: Mythic Greek ship of Jason in the Argonautica, often cited as the archetype of long-voyage exploration narrative.
Armada: Spanish fleet of 1588 dispatched by Philip II against Elizabethan England; its defeat marked a shift in Atlantic naval power.
Astrolabe: Medieval Arab and European altitude-measuring instrument adapted as the mariner's astrolabe in the fifteenth century.
Atlantic Convoy System: Allied convoy organization in both World Wars protecting merchant shipping across the North Atlantic.

B

Baltic Timber Trade: Long-running European trade in masts, deals, and pitch from Riga, Memel, and Saint Petersburg.
Battle of Jutland: 1916 North Sea fleet action between the British Grand Fleet and the German High Seas Fleet.
Battle of Lepanto: 1571 galley battle in which the Holy League defeated the Ottoman fleet in the Gulf of Patras.
Battle of Midway: June 1942 Pacific carrier battle, a turning point against Imperial Japan.
Battle of the Atlantic: Longest continuous campaign of the Second World War, 1939 to 1945, between Allied convoys and German U-boats.
Battle of Trafalgar: Royal Navy victory of 21 October 1805 under Nelson over the combined Franco-Spanish fleet.
Bireme: Ancient Mediterranean galley with two banks of oars.
Bombarda: Mediterranean two-masted vessel adapted from bomb ketches.
Brigantine: Two-masted vessel with square-rigged foremast and fore-and-aft mainmast, common in eighteenth and nineteenth century coastal trade.
Buss: Dutch herring-fishing vessel of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

C

Captain Cook's Voyages: Three Pacific voyages 1768 to 1779 in HMS Endeavour, Resolution, and Discovery.
Caravel: Small lateen-rigged Iberian exploring vessel of the fifteenth century, used by Portuguese explorers along Africa.
Carrack: Three or four masted ocean-going merchantman developed in fifteenth century Iberia; example, Santa Maria.
Challenger Expedition: 1872 to 1876 British circumnavigation that founded modern oceanography.
Clipper: Mid-nineteenth century sharp-hulled fast sailing ship built for tea, opium, wool, and California trades.
Cog: Single-masted Hanseatic League cargo carrier of the high medieval Baltic and North Sea.
Compass Rose: Wind rose device printed on charts since the portolan era of the late thirteenth century.
Containerization: Post-1956 revolution in cargo handling initiated by Malcom McLean's converted tanker Ideal X.
Convoy: Group of merchant ships sailing under naval escort.
Cross-staff: Pre-sextant altitude instrument used from the sixteenth century.

D

Davis Quadrant: Backstaff invented by John Davis around 1594.
Deadweight tonnage: DWT, total weight a vessel can carry.
Dhow: Lateen-rigged Arab and East African trading vessel of the western Indian Ocean.
Disaster Inquiry: Formal investigation tradition exemplified by the Titanic and Lusitania inquiries.
Dogger: Two-masted English North Sea fishing vessel of the seventeenth century.
Doldrums: Equatorial region of light and variable winds within the ITCZ.
Donitz Wolfpack: Coordinated U-boat group tactics employed in the Battle of the Atlantic.
Drake's Circumnavigation: 1577 to 1580 voyage by Francis Drake in the Golden Hind.
Drakkar: Norse longship type used for raiding from the eighth to eleventh centuries.
Dutch East India Company (VOC): Chartered 1602, the first multinational joint-stock company and dominant Asian trader of the seventeenth century.

E

East India Trade: European spice and textile commerce with India and Southeast Asia, sixteenth to nineteenth centuries.
East Indiaman: Large merchant vessel of the various East India Companies.
Egyptian Reed Ships: Predynastic and Old Kingdom vessels of the Nile and Red Sea.
Empress of Ireland: 1914 St. Lawrence sinking with 1012 deaths.
Enclosure Period: Late Tudor English maritime expansion enabling Atlantic ventures.
Endeavour, HMB: Cook's first-voyage Royal Navy bark.
Endurance Expedition: Shackleton's 1914 to 1917 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition.
Erebus and Terror: Royal Navy bomb vessels of the lost Franklin Expedition of 1845.
Estonia, MS: 1994 Baltic ferry sinking with 852 deaths.
Exxon Valdez: 1989 grounding in Prince William Sound, a benchmark pollution disaster.

F

Falklands Conflict 1982: Maritime campaign including taskforce logistics, STUFT, and the loss of HMS Sheffield.
First Fleet: 1787 to 1788 British convoy that founded the colony of New South Wales.
Fishery Protection Squadron: Royal Navy unit of historic continuity since the seventeenth century.
Fluyt: Dutch cargo carrier of the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, optimized for low crew costs.
Foochow Pole Junk: Chinese river junk historically used in Min River trade.
Fore-and-Aft Schooner: New England trade rig prevailing through the nineteenth century coastal trade.
Fram: Polar exploration ship of Nansen and later Amundsen, launched 1892.
Fram Strait Drift: Nansen's planned ice drift across the Arctic Ocean, 1893 to 1896.
Franklin Expedition: 1845 Royal Navy Arctic expedition lost in search of the Northwest Passage.
Frigate, Sailing: Single-gun-deck cruising warship of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

G

Galleas, Dutch: Coasting vessel of the North Sea.
Galleass: Hybrid oared-and-sailed warship type used by Venice at Lepanto.
Galleon: Iberian sailing warship and treasure carrier of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Galley: Oared Mediterranean warship type from antiquity into the seventeenth century.
Golden Age of Piracy: Roughly 1650 to 1730 in the Caribbean, Indian Ocean, and Atlantic.
Grain Trade: Sailing-era and modern bulk trade route, notably the Australian Grain Race of the 1920s and 1930s.
Grand Banks: Atlantic fishing grounds off Newfoundland, central to cod history.
Grand Fleet: British Royal Navy main battle force in the First World War.
Greek Trireme: Three-banked oared warship of fifth-century BCE Athens.
Guano Trade: Nineteenth-century Pacific trade in Chincha Islands seabird fertilizer.

H

Halifax Explosion: 1917 collision and detonation of the munitions ship Mont-Blanc in Halifax Harbour.
Hanseatic League: Medieval North European trading confederation centered on Lubeck.
Hellenistic Sea Power: Ptolemaic and Seleucid naval forces of the eastern Mediterranean.
Henry the Navigator: Portuguese prince and patron of Atlantic exploration 1394 to 1460.
High Seas Fleet: Imperial German Navy battle fleet of the First World War.
HMS Beagle: Royal Navy survey brig that carried Darwin 1831 to 1836.
Hoek Tradition: Dutch shipbuilding tradition associated with North Holland yards.
Holystone: Sandstone block used to scour wooden decks during the age of sail.
Hoy: Small English coasting vessel of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Hugli Trade: Bengal-based East India trade with European factories.

I

Ice Trade: Nineteenth-century New England export of natural lake ice to the Caribbean and India.
Imperial Russian Navy: Tsarist fleet operative until 1917.
Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition: Shackleton's 1914 to 1917 Endurance expedition.
Indiaman: Generic term for British, Dutch, Danish, and French East India Company vessels.
Industrial Steam Era: Mid-nineteenth century shift from sail to steam propulsion in long-distance trades.
Inshore Squadron: Royal Navy close-blockade force off Brest during the Napoleonic Wars.
International Mercantile Marine: Early twentieth-century shipping trust controlling White Star and other lines.
International Whaling Era: Eighteenth and nineteenth century pelagic whaling.
Irish Sea Smuggling: Eighteenth-century clandestine trade in tea, spirits, and tobacco.
Ironclad: Mid-nineteenth century iron-armored warship; HMS Warrior and CSS Virginia are early examples.

J

Japan Trade: Dejima-era seventeenth to nineteenth century Dutch maritime commerce.
Jeannette Expedition: 1879 Arctic expedition under De Long.
Jervis Bay, HMS: Armed merchant cruiser lost defending convoy HX 84 in 1940.
Jervis's Squadron: Royal Navy Mediterranean force under Sir John Jervis culminating at Cape St. Vincent 1797.
John Company: Colloquial term for the British East India Company.
Jolly Roger: Black piratical flag tradition of the early eighteenth century Caribbean.
Junk: Chinese flat-bottomed seagoing vessel with battened lugsails, attested from the Han dynasty.
Junker Era German Shipping: Late nineteenth century rise of Hapag and Norddeutscher Lloyd lines.
Jutes: Early medieval North Sea seafaring people from southern Jutland.
Jutland, Battle of: Largest battleship action of the First World War, 31 May to 1 June 1916.

K

K-class Submarine: Steam-powered British submarines of the First World War.
Kamikaze Typhoons: Storms of 1274 and 1281 that wrecked Mongol invasion fleets bound for Japan.
Kentledge Ballast: Historic iron-pig ballast used in East Indiamen.
King's Letter Boys: Seventeenth-century scheme for the entry of officer aspirants in the Royal Navy.
Klondike Gold Rush Shipping: 1897 to 1899 Pacific steamer rush to Skagway.
Knockabout Schooner: Late nineteenth century New England fishing schooner without bowsprit.
Korean Turtle Ship: Geobukseon, the armored vessel used by Yi Sun-sin in the 1590s.
Kowloon Trade: Hong Kong-based China coastal trade.
Kursk Disaster: 2000 sinking of the Russian Oscar-class submarine.
Kvalsund Boats: Pre-Viking Norwegian vessel finds at Kvalsund.

L

L'Orient: French flagship destroyed at the Battle of the Nile, 1798.
Lateen Rig: Triangular fore-and-aft sail of Mediterranean and Indian Ocean origin.
Letter of Marque: Royal commission authorizing private vessels to attack enemy shipping.
Liberty Ship: Mass-produced EC2-S-C1 emergency cargo ship of the Second World War, 2,710 built.
Lighter: Flat-bottomed harbor vessel for transferring cargo to and from ships in roadsteads.
Limey: Historical nickname for British sailors from the issue of lime juice against scurvy.
Liner Conferences: Late nineteenth century rate-setting cartels of liner shipping.
Lloyd's Coffee House: Edward Lloyd's 1686 London establishment, origin of Lloyd's of London insurance.
Longship: Viking clinker-built oared sailing vessel of the eighth to eleventh centuries.
Lusitania: Cunard liner torpedoed by U-20 on 7 May 1915 with 1,198 deaths.

M

Magellan's Circumnavigation: 1519 to 1522 voyage completed under Elcano in Victoria.
Mariner's Compass: Magnetized needle device introduced to Europe in the late twelfth century.
Maritime Republics: Medieval Italian seapowers, Venice, Genoa, Pisa, and Amalfi.
Mary Rose: Tudor warship sunk in 1545 in the Solent and raised in 1982.
Mayflower: 1620 English vessel that carried the Pilgrim Fathers to Plymouth.
Mediterranean Galley System: Long-running oared warship culture of Venice, Genoa, Spain, and the Ottoman Empire.
Merchant Navy: Collective civilian shipping fleet of a nation, particularly the British Merchant Navy.
Middle Passage: Atlantic leg of the triangular slave trade from West Africa to the Americas.
Motor Ship Era: Twentieth-century transition from steam to diesel propulsion, marked by Selandia, 1912.
Mulberry Harbour: Prefabricated artificial harbour deployed at Normandy in 1944.

N

Napoleonic Wars at Sea: Royal Navy campaigns 1803 to 1815 including Trafalgar.
Nautical Almanac: Annual joint UK/US publication.
Naval Defence Act 1889: British two-power-standard legislation.
Naval Stores: Tar, pitch, turpentine, and rosin trade central to historic ship maintenance.
New Bedford Whaling: Massachusetts whaling industry of the nineteenth century.
Newcastle Coal Trade: Coastwise English coal traffic from Tyneside, including the cat-bark type.
Nile, Battle of the: 1798 Nelson victory over the French at Aboukir Bay.
Nordic Iron Age Vessels: Vessel finds such as Nydam and Hjortspring.
Norse Knarr: Viking-era ocean cargo vessel used for North Atlantic colonization.
Northwest Passage: Arctic sea route through the Canadian Archipelago, first transited 1903 to 1906 by Amundsen.

O

Oar-and-Sail Ship: Common Mediterranean classical antiquity hybrid configuration.
Oared Galleass: Hybrid type used by Venice in the sixteenth century.
Ocean Liner Era: Roughly 1870 to 1960, the dominance of scheduled passenger steamers on transoceanic routes.
Old Ironsides: Nickname of USS Constitution, launched 1797.
Onassis Era: Mid-twentieth century rise of Greek tanker tycoons.
Opium Clipper: Mid-nineteenth century fast vessel in the China opium trade.
Oseberg Ship: Viking burial vessel found in Norway in 1904.
Ottoman Navy: Imperial fleet of the Ottoman Empire from the fourteenth century.
Outport Trade: Colonial New England and Newfoundland fish trade.
Overseas Container Line: 1965 British-formed early containership operator.

P

Pacific Trade Winds: Climatology critical to Manila Galleon navigation.
Packet Ship: Scheduled transatlantic mail and passenger sailing ship of the early nineteenth century.
Panamax: Dry bulk or container vessel sized for the original Panama Canal locks.
Phoenician Trade: Iron Age maritime commerce across the Mediterranean from Tyre and Sidon.
Pirate Round: Late seventeenth century circuit by American pirates to the Indian Ocean.
Pohnpei Trade: Nineteenth century Pacific whaling and trading port.
Pomor Trade: Seasonal Russian White Sea trade with northern Norway.
Portolan Chart: Medieval Mediterranean coastal chart series of the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries.
Privateer: Privately owned vessel licensed by a state to attack enemy shipping.
Punic Wars: Three Roman-Carthaginian conflicts, central to ancient naval history.

Q

Q-Ship: Historic decoy armed merchantman; archaic but cited in doctrine.
Qing Maritime Bans: Haijin policies restricting Chinese seagoing trade.
Quadrant, Davis: Late sixteenth century altitude-measuring instrument.
Quartermaster: Helmsman on watch.
Quebec Convoy: Wartime Canadian Atlantic escort assembly.
Queen Mary, RMS: Cunard liner of 1936, troop transport in the Second World War.
Quinquereme: Hellenistic and Roman oared warship with five-file oar arrangement.
Quintireme: Roman large oared warship known from Polybius.
Quirinal Maritime Code: Italian Renaissance maritime legal compilation.
Quoddy Boat: Maine and New Brunswick fishing sloop type.

R

Reciprocating Engine Era: Late nineteenth and early twentieth century triple- and quadruple-expansion steam plants.
Red Duster: Nickname for the British Merchant Navy red ensign.
Reefer Trade: Refrigerated meat and fruit trade from the late nineteenth century.
Roaring Forties: Strong westerly winds between 40 and 50 degrees south.
Roman Imperial Fleet: Classis Misenensis and Classis Ravennas standing fleets.
Rotary Sail Era: Early twentieth-century Flettner rotor experiments.
Rotterdam: Major Dutch port historically central to European trade.
Royal Navy: Naval forces of the United Kingdom, the senior service since the sixteenth century.
Royal William, SS: 1833 Canadian-built early transatlantic steam crossing.
Russian Imperial Navy: Imperial Russian seapower 1696 to 1917.

S

Sail to Steam Transition: Mid to late nineteenth century gradual displacement of sail by screw steamers.
Schooner: Two- or more-masted fore-and-aft rigged vessel of New England origin.
Slave Trade, Atlantic: Sixteenth to nineteenth century forced transportation across the Middle Passage.
Spanish Treasure Fleet: Flota de Indias system 1566 to 1790 between Seville-Cadiz and the Indies.
Spice Trade: Long-running commerce in pepper, cloves, nutmeg, and cinnamon from the Indies.
Square-Rigged Ship: Vessel with primarily square sails set athwartships, the dominant ocean rig until the late nineteenth century.
Steam Packet: Early nineteenth century steamship on coastal and short-sea routes.
Submarine Warfare: From Bushnell's Turtle in 1776 through the world wars.
Suez Canal: Opened 1869, reshaping global shipping routes between Europe and Asia.
Sutton Hoo Ship: Anglo-Saxon ship burial of the early seventh century.

T

Tea Race: Annual nineteenth-century clipper races from Foochow to London.
Titanic, RMS: White Star liner that sank on 15 April 1912 with 1,517 deaths.
Tonnage Wars: Twentieth-century Allied versus Axis merchant attrition campaigns.
Trade Winds: Persistent easterly winds in the tropics.
Trafalgar, Battle of: 1805 Nelson victory off Cape Trafalgar.
Tramping: Charter-driven non-scheduled cargo trade of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Transatlantic Cable Ships: Mid-nineteenth century cable layers including the Great Eastern.
Treasure Voyages: Ming dynasty fleets under Zheng He, 1405 to 1433.
Triangular Trade: Three-leg Atlantic trade pattern linking Europe, Africa, and the Americas.
Trireme: Ancient Greek three-banked oared warship of the fifth century BCE.

U

U-Boat: Imperial and Nazi German submarine, central to the Battle of the Atlantic.
Uluburun Wreck: Late Bronze Age wreck off Anatolia, c. 1320 BCE.
Underwater Telegraph: Mid-nineteenth century submarine cable infrastructure.
Union Castle Line: South African mail and passenger line, founded 1900.
United Fruit Company: Early twentieth century operator of the Great White Fleet of reefer ships.
Unrestricted Submarine Warfare: Imperial German policy of 1917.
Upper Yard Sailor: Historic able seaman skilled at working highest yards.
USS Constitution: 1797 American heavy frigate preserved at Boston.
USS Monitor: 1862 Union ironclad of the Battle of Hampton Roads.
Utrecht Treaty 1713: Settlement awarding Britain the Asiento slave-trade contract.

V

Vasa: Swedish royal warship sunk on her maiden voyage in 1628, salvaged 1961.
Vasco da Gama: Portuguese navigator who reached India by sea in 1498.
Venetian Arsenal: State shipbuilding complex of the Venetian Republic.
Vespucci, Amerigo: Florentine navigator whose name was applied to the Americas.
Victory Ship: Improved Second World War American cargo vessel succeeding the Liberty design.
Victory, HMS: Nelson's flagship at Trafalgar, launched 1765, preserved at Portsmouth.
Viking Age: Roughly 793 to 1066, marked by Norse seafaring expansion.
VOC: Dutch East India Company, chartered 1602.
Voortrekker Maritime Lines: South African historical coastal carriers.
Voyage of Discovery: Generic term for organized scientific or exploratory expedition.

W

West India Trade: Sugar, rum, and molasses commerce of the Caribbean.
Westphalian Maritime Order: Seventeenth century basis for the modern state-flag system.
Whaling Era: From early Basque whaling to twentieth century pelagic factory fleets.
Wherry, Norfolk: Inland sailing trader of the Norfolk Broads.
White Star Line: British shipping company 1845 to 1934, operator of Olympic, Titanic, and Britannic.
Windjammer: Late nineteenth and early twentieth century large steel sailing cargo vessel.
Wool Clipper: Sailing ship in the Australian wool trade.
World War I Shipping Crisis: 1917 Allied tonnage emergency under unrestricted U-boat warfare.
World War II Convoy Battles: 1939 to 1945 North Atlantic campaign.
Wreckers: Coastal communities salvaging cargoes from stranded vessels.

X

X-Craft: Royal Navy midget submarines of the Second World War.
Xanten Roman River Boats: First-century inland vessels excavated in Germany.
Xebec: Three-masted Mediterranean vessel with lateen and square rig combinations.
Xebec-Frigate: Hybrid French Mediterranean cruiser type.
Xeresean Wine Trade: Sherry export trade from Cadiz and Jerez.
Xerxean Naval Defeat: Battle of Salamis, 480 BCE.
Xerxes' Bridge of Boats: 480 BCE Persian pontoon crossing of the Hellespont.
Xiamen Trade: Historic Amoy port commerce in tea and porcelain.
Xinjiang Silk Route Maritime Link: Tang-era integration of overland and Indian Ocean trade.
Xiphias Frigate: Generic Greek antiquarian rigged-vessel name.

Y

Yamato, Japanese Battleship: Largest battleship ever built, sunk in 1945.
Yangtze River Trade: Chinese inland junk trade.
Yankee Clipper: New England fast sailing packet of the mid-nineteenth century.
Yard, Royal Navy: Royal Dockyards at Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Chatham among others.
Yawl: Two-masted fore-and-aft rigged vessel with small mizzen aft of the rudder post.
Yokohama Specie Bank: Late nineteenth century financier of Japanese shipping.
York-Antwerp Rules: CMI-drafted rules for adjustment of general average; current editions 1994, 2004, 2016.
Yorktown Naval Campaign: French and American blockade of 1781.
Younger Edda Maritime References: Norse literary record of seafaring.
Yugoslav Adriatic Trade: Twentieth-century Adriatic coastal commerce.

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