Dating from 2,500 BC, this boat was found in a pit at Giza in Egypt where it had been dismantled as a grave offering for the Pharaoh Khufu. Measuring 141 feet (43m) long and 16 feet (5m) wide, it is known as a ‘solar barge’, a ritual vessel to carry the king and later his embalmed body. Built of Lebanon cedar, it seems to have been propelled by oars as there is no room for sails. Discovered in 1954, the ship was painstakingly reconstructed and will be back on display at the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza when it opens in November 2022.
Roman author Suetonius described a ship built by the Emperor Caligula in the 1st century AD as having 'jewels, space for baths and galleries, and containing vines and fruit'. He was probably describing one of the ships discovered in Lake Nemi 17 miles (30km) south of Rome, Italy. In 1895, an investigation began and two ships were discovered, each measuring 230 feet (70m) by 66 feet (20m) and propelled by oars. In 1927, Italian dictator Mussolini ordered the lake drained and the ships were photographed. Sadly the vessels were destroyed by fire during the Second World War.
‘I've never heard of a ship more splendidly laden with weapons for battle and dress for war,’ proclaims the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf. The description could have been about the 7th-century ship that was found in a burial mound at Sutton Hoo, Suffolk, England, in 1939. All that remained of the hull was the impression of the wood as well as the iron nails binding it. The ship was 88 feet (27m) long and 16 feet (5m) wide with 40 oars and the exquisite goods found with it suggest it was the burial ground of a king.
In 1880 this Viking-era ship was discovered in Gokstad burial mound near Sandefjord in Norway. At 75 feet (23m) long and 16 feet (5m) wide, the vessel was clinker-built of overlapping oak boards and could carry 32 oarsmen with a total crew of 70. Built at the height of the Vikings' power, the ship had a 1,184 square feet (110sqm) sail and a single mast that could be lowered. The burial site also contained the body of a man in his forties and other artefacts including three more small boats. The boat and surviving items are usually on show at the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, however the site is being rebuilt and is set to reopen in 2025.
In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue – as the children’s rhyme goes. The largest of his three ships on that voyage was the Santa Maria, probably built in Spain, although her date of construction isn't recorded. It was a carack-style ship, meaning it had three masts and was designed for ocean sailing. Measuring 115 feet (35m) long, it had a crew of 40 with tiny cabins where the sailors took it in turns to sleep. This beautiful replica was built in 1992 to mark the 500th anniversary and is now docked at Funchal, Madeira, Portugal.
The Geobukseon, also known as a Korean Turtle Ship, was an innovative military boat used during the Imjin War from 1592 to 1598, when Japan invaded Korea twice. Although linked to this period, it’s thought that Geobukseon was developed much earlier, possibly during the late Goryeo Dynasty (AD 918-1392). With a spiked rooftop to stop intruders, a line of holes along the side from which weapons could be hurled, and capacity for up to 80 rowers, she was a highly advanced warship.
It's estimated that 600 oak trees were felled to build the pride of Henry VIII’s fleet, the Mary Rose. Launched in 1511, the carack-style ship was upgraded in 1536 and comprised four levels separated by three decks. It was heavily armed with a crew of 400-500 men. In 1545, the Mary Rose was in the Solent, off the south English coast when she attempted a sharp turn and sank in 40 feet (12m) of water. In 1982, the 500-year-old ship was brought to the surface and is now at the Mary Rose Museum in Portsmouth.
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The original Golden Hind was a galleon captained by Sir Francis Drake – a privateer who attacked Spanish ships for their treasure – during his circumnavigation of the globe between 1577 and 1580. Around 102 feet (31m) long, with 18 canons and a crew of 80, she had many decks, three or more masts and a distinctive squared-off stern. When the galleon returned to England, Queen Elizabeth I entered the ship and proclaimed it should be preserved for posterity. It survived for nearly a hundred years and since then, many replicas have been made. Pictured is a full-size duplicate of the Golden Hinde that has sailed all over the world and can now be seen in London on Bankside, near Southwark Cathedral.
The year 2020 marked 400 years since the Mayflower sailed from Plymouth, England to Cape Cod in present-day Massachusetts, with 102 English passengers hoping to start a new life in North America. Crewed by 30 men it took two months to cross the Atlantic. Probably built in London, the ship was 90 feet (27m) long and weighed 160 tonnes. She had three masts, and three levels: main deck, gun deck and cargo hold. The replica pictured was built in Devon, England, in 1955.
While submarines didn’t play big role in military action until the First World War (1914 to 1918), it may surprise you to know the earliest plans for an underwater vessel date from the 1570s. English mathematician and seaman William Bourne made the first designs in 1578. However, his models never got built. The first fully working underwater vessel was launched 42 years later by Cornelius Drebbel. The ‘Drebbel’ was probably a leather-clad rowing boat and King James, alongside astonished Londoners, watched the primitive sub dive 15 feet (4.5m) into the River Thames for the first time in 1620.
King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden commissioned the Vasa warship to be built with two gun decks and 64 bronze cannons. On 10 August 1628, she set sail on her maiden voyage, but barely out of the harbour the ship keeled over and sank, with the loss of 30 lives. In 1962, she was brought to the surface in a remarkable state of preservation and it became clear the ship sank because of a faulty design. Today the beautiful vessel can be seen at the dedicated Vasa Museum in Stockholm.
In 1717, British pirate Edward Teach – usually known as Blackbeard – captured La Concorde, a ship that had been operating the transatlantic slave trade route from Nantes, France. Blackbeard refitted her and called her Queen Anne’s Revenge, likely to show his support for the British monarch Queen Anne, who had died in 1714. Blackbeard crossed the Atlantic attacking Dutch, British and Portuguese merchant ships along the way, but in 1718, the ship sank off Charleston, South Carolina. In 1996, the wreck was found and many artefacts including the huge anchor were brought to the surface – but sadly no giant chests of gold. Pictured is a model of Queen Anne's Revenge.
The first European ship to reach the east coast of Australia, HMS Endeavour and lieutenant James Cook, who commanded it, have gone down in history for their first voyage of discovery from 1768 to 1771. After the Pacific sailings, the ship was largely forgotten until the American War of Independence when the British scuttled her off the coast of Rhode Island. Today, a replica is berthed alongside the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney but researchers suspect they've found the real deal after investigating the area around Newport Harbor for 22 years.
Around 6,000 trees, mostly oak, were used to construct the battleship HMS Victory in 1765. Measuring 186 feet (57m) and loaded with 100 guns, her three masts meant she could travel faster than most ships of her size. Around 830 men lived and worked in very cramped and uncomfortable conditions while officers had more luxurious quarters. HMS Victory had many military encounters but the most famous was the Battle of Trafalgar, under the British naval commander Nelson, in 1805. The ship was rescued and today is open to the public at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, Hampshire, England.
Neither a boat nor a ship, the Turtle was a one-man submarine used during the American Revolution. It was designed by the inventor David Bushnell and made of oak and iron, with the aim of destroying British warships thanks to a detachable mine. Unfortunately, all of its missions, including one to sink HMS Eagle in New York harbour in 1776, failed. George Washington was apparently an admirer of the technology however, writing to Thomas Jefferson: “I then thought, and still think, that it was an effort of genius.” It would take more than a century before submarines would be at the forefront of military operations.
Built in 1784 to carry coal, HMS Bounty has a dark story. She was refitted by the Royal Navy to transport breadfruit cuttings from Tahiti to the West Indies, to be grown as food for enslaved people. Under Captain Bligh, the expedition reached Tahiti from England, but mutiny broke out, led by Fletcher Christian, over Bligh’s harsh rule. Bligh and a group of his crew were set adrift on a small boat but against all the odds, survived. The replica pictured was built for the 1962 film Mutiny on the Bounty but sank during Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
The USS Constitution, known as Old Ironsides, is the oldest ship in the world still afloat. Launched in 1797, she is a three-masted, wooden-hulled frigate. She took part in the 1812 war against the British, was a training ship during the Civil War and took American artwork to France for the Paris Exposition in 1878. In 1997, 200 years after she was launched, she once again took to the sea under her own sails from her berth in Boston.
Charles Darwin set sail on HMS Beagle in 1831 from Plymouth, England. He was 22 years old and hired to be the ship's naturalist on its journey around the globe. Launched in 1820, the Beagle was a two-masted vessel intended for work as a courier and other light duties. Her five-year journey around the world was to investigate measurements of longitude and for Darwin to collect fossils, plant samples and make a record of different animals. The studies gave rise to his thoughts and writings on evolution that still influence scientific thinking today. HMS Beagle, however, was eventually dismantled for scrap.
When launched in 1843, the Great Britain was the largest vessel afloat at 321 feet (98m) long. Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, she was one of the first to have a hull made of iron and was powered by both steam and sail. Designed to carry passengers quickly across the Atlantic – which she did in 14 days – her four decks provided accommodation for 360 passengers and 120 crew. The ship was later used to carry immigrants to Australia and is today preserved in Bristol as a museum.
In Britain, tea was so popular from the 18th century that specialist tea clipper ships designed for speed were big business. The Cutty Sark, built in 1869, was the fastest of its time, made of teak and elm attached to a lightweight and streamlined iron frame. It was one of the last of its kind, thanks to the introduction of steamships and the opening of the Suez Canal, which cut the journey time to India dramatically. Today you can see the Cutty Sark at Greenwich, London.
When launched in 1906, the Lusitania was the largest ship in the world at 787 feet (240m) long, although she was overtaken by sister ship RMS Mauretania shortly afterwards. What the Lusitania is best known for, however, is her role in the First World War. On 7 May 1915, she was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat while travelling from New York to Liverpool, England. Some 1,100 of the passengers onboard died, and the bombing is believed to have been the first of a series of events that led to the US joining the conflict.
Launched in Norway in 1912, the Endurance was powered by steam and sail and designed with a strong oak hull to take tourists through the country's Arctic ice. British explorer Ernest Shackleton bought her in 1914 for his Antarctic expedition. With a crew of 27, he sailed from Plymouth, England for Buenos Aires, Argentina then onto South Georgia and the Weddell Sea. By January 1915, the pack ice trapped the ship and she drifted for months until she finally sank in November 1915. Miraculously, all the men survived. In March 2022, the shipwreck was finally located at the bottom of the Weddell Sea – eerily on the hundredth anniversary of Shackleton’s funeral.
Probably the world's most famous ship, the Titanic was built at the Harland & Wolff shipyard in Belfast, Northern Ireland and sank in April 1912 on her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York. The largest ship at the time, she was designed to be the safest vessel ever built, with 16 watertight compartments that meant she could stay afloat even if four of these flooded. However after she hit an iceberg, five compartments were breached and the ship went down taking the lives of 1,500 with her.
One ship has given its name to an entire group in the UK – the Windrush Generation. Originally called Monte Rosa, the Windrush was built as a cruise ship in Hamburg in 1930 and served as a troop ship during the Second World War. She was commandeered by the British after the war and renamed Empire Windrush. In 1948, she brought the first group of 492 UK citizens born in the Commonwealth from the Caribbean to London. Those people helped rebuild Britain after the war and are known today as the Windrush Generation. Empire Windrush met a sad end in 1954 when a fire broke out in her engine room and she sank off the coast of Algeria with the loss of four crew.
The naming of the Queen Mary is the stuff of legend. The story goes that in 1930, Cunard Line approached King George V saying they wanted to name their transatlantic liner after Britain’s greatest queen. Although Cunard meant Queen Victoria, the then king replied his wife would be delighted, so they had to call the new vessel the Queen Mary. Her maiden voyage was in 1936 travelling from Southampton to New York via Cherbourg. During the Second World War, she served as a troop ship but then continued as a passenger ship. She is now moored in Long Beach, California as a floating hotel.
Named after the 19th-century German chancellor, the Bismarck (and her sister Tirpitz) were built by the Nazis and remain the largest battleships produced by any European country. Launched in 1939, Bismarck was deployed in the North Atlantic Ocean to disrupt shipping between North America and Great Britain. In 1941, a battle with HMS Prince of Wales damaged the Bismarck and further attacks by torpedo bombers from HMS Ark Royal crippled her so badly the crew scuttled her. In 1989, the wreck was located by Robert Ballard, who four years earlier had found the Titanic.
In the 1930s, the Japanese government decided to build up its navy to expand the Japanese empire. The lead ship Yamato was powered by four steam turbines and when she launched in 1940 was one of the two biggest battleships ever made. In October 1944, Yamoto took part in one of the largest naval engagements in history, the Battle of Leyte Gulf, when the Japanese confronted the combined Australian and American fleet off the coast of the Philippines. In April 1945, Yamoto was sunk off Okinawa.
A 98 feet (30m) ceremonial waka (canoe) was launched in Aotearoa (New Zealand) on 6 February 1940, a century after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand's founding document. Ngãtokimatawhaorua is named for the original waka sailed by Kupe the navigator, who in Māori oral tradition is said to have discovered Aotearoa. It's launched each year on Waitangi Day and requires at least 76 paddlers to handle it – once in the water it can weigh up to 12 tonnes. Pictured is the carved figurehead on the tauihu (prow).
Launched in November 1943, USS Hood was the lead ammunition ship of the US Navy during the Second World War. Assigned to carry cargo to the Pacific, she made her way through the Panama Canal and in August 1944 berthed at Manus Island Papua New Guinea. In November, she was moored outside the harbour when an explosion totally destroyed the ship killing all 350 men on board and damaging 22 other vessels. It was thought the explosion was caused by an accident.
The longest-serving US Navy aircraft carrier in the 20th century, the USS Midway was commissioned on 10 September 1945, just one week after the Second World War ended. She played an important role in the Cold War, was deployed for combat during airstrikes in Vietnam in 1965, as well as serving as a floating Air Force base for helicopters during the fall of Saigon in 1975. Decommissioned in 1992, she can now be visited as part of the USS Midway Museum in San Diego, California.
The Royal Yacht Britannia was launched in Clydebank, Scotland, in 1953. Designed to carry the royal family to all points of the globe, for 44 years she travelled more than a million miles and hosted state visits, honeymoons and holidays – she's pictured here in San Diego, California. Powered by two steam turbines and with three masts, the ship has luxurious cabins and facilities. In 1994, she was retired and is now moored and open to the public in the Port of Leith in Edinburgh.
Made of Honduran mahogany, this two-masted sailing boat was the yacht in which St Francis Chichester completed the first single-handed circumnavigation of the globe in 1966-67. Aged 64, he set out from Plymouth and made only one stop in Sydney then rounded Cape Horn on his way home. He completed the journey in nine months and a day. Afterwards, he called Gipsy Moth ‘one of the worst racing yachts ever built’. The Gypsy Moth is now privately owned and set to have three homes across London, Buckler's Hard (Hampshire) and a berth in The Hague.
Built by Cunard to work the transatlantic route from Europe to America, Queen Elizabeth II, known as QE2 bridged the gap between ocean liner and modern-day cruise ship. She made her maiden voyage in 1969 and was one of the fastest liners ever built. Originally steam-powered, she was refurbished in 1986 and fitted with diesel and electric motors. QE2 could carry 2,000 passengers in air-conditioned luxury on her trips between Southampton and New York, but she also cruised to destinations around the world, including Sydney. In 2008, after 806 transatlantic crossings, she took her final voyage and now is moored as a floating hotel in Port Rashid, Dubai.
Drawing passengers from across the globe, Carnival Cruise Line broke the mould making cruising unstuffy and affordable. One of the brand's most beloved boats was the Carnival Fantasy. Entering service in 1990 and the first of a series of eight ships, her modern but over-the-top interiors included a huge glitzy atrium and Egyptian statues. Groundbreaking when launched, this 70,367-tonne, 855-foot (260m) long vessel would be dwarfed by today's megaships, but she still had a 30-year career sailing around the Western Caribbean and Mexico from Miami. She was scrapped in 2020.
The Yara Birkeland is the world’s first electric and self-propelled container ship, created by Norwegian chemical company Yara International and tech firm Kongsberg. In 2022 it signed the world's first commercial agreement on cross-border CO2 transport and storage, and when finalised will transport CO2 from an ammonia and fertiliser plant in the Netherlands to permanent storage beneath a seabed off the coast of western Norway. With World Maritime Day (29 September) emphasising greener shipping technologies, the groundbreaking ship demonstrates the potential future of the shipping industry.