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"Square rig was the main design in the age of sail, (1571—1863)." I removed this line because I cannot understand what it means. The largest vessels were all square-rigged during the period, but I'd be surprised to hear that even the majority of vessels of any time were square-rigged. Czrisher 15:42, 10 August 2007 (UTC) The square rig is atleast as good as the gaff rig even when sailing windward, but require more experienced crew for the same perfomance then other rigs. I'm however not experienced with sailing other rigs then these two...(not realy experienced with these either, only sailed a few months in square a riged sailing ship and only training sailing in gaff riged sailing ship) Anyways, I say this because I know that a ship from the sailing school I was on not to long ago fosen folkehøyskole have outsailed gaff riged ships on several ocations. The square rig don't have a mast infront of the sail that cause turbulence in the wind like the gaff sail. I don't want to edit the article without better proves then my own(rather limited) experiance. I hope atleast someone here is willing to consider either editing or atlest finding more information on the subject. If I'm wrong, me being only a student in sailing and stuff, I'd like to know, and I'd like more information about why you people belive I'm wrong. Luredreier 23:23, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
As I could not manage on Old revision of User_talk:Facius maybe someone can help me here: Facius updated "Square Rig" with the definition A ship at least partially so rigged is called a square rigger. In the german wiki we have a discussion about this, maybe somebody has source. O has it just been the resume of the article? -- CeGe ( talk) 07:39, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
"Principally square rigged types A barque ... A brig ... A full rigged ship ... A sloop has only one mast."
Oh, really? A sloop is a "principally square rigged type"? No. A sloop is, by definition, fore-and-aft rigged. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.68.134.1 ( talk) 21:31, 13 January 2010 (UTC)
should the link to Single square sail ship be pointed to Cog_(ship) instead?
academic articles use cog as a blanket term for the single-masted square-rig.
Longpinkytoes ( talk) 17:08, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
The Austronesian content added in the edits starting with [2] do not seem to be supported by the sources given. Even if they are, they describe an entirely different technology than the subject of the article.
The evolution of pacific canoe rigs (1986) Horridge. This paper is very tentative about the "spritsail" rigs of the region. The author uses the word "perhaps" with the first mention of the Indian Ocean Double Sprit Sail. Discussion by the author of rafts equipped with square sails is clearly speculative - at least that is how the author has written it. Horridge's dating of use of sail by Austronesians is stated more clearly in his later paper in The Austronesians: Historical and Comparative Perspectives states that they had sails "some time before 2000 BC". He makes no mention of "square" sails at all, apart from mention of "square rigged ships" and the sail on Kon-Tiki (and experiment that he discounts). Any editor using this reference to support the article text in question needs to explain exactly how it does so. Such explanation should not rely on the paper explaining theories that are not supported by the author.
The Lateen Sail in World History (1995) Campbell. Whilst this paper includes discussion of the triangular sail in question, it gives no firm opinion as to its date of origin. Nor does it attribute it to development by Austronesians.
Maritime Southeast Asia to 1500. I do not have a copy of this book. However, an online review states that: "the book contains many errors of fact, misleading simplifications of material, and references that are frequently inadequate, inappropriate or outdated." [3] That suggests that it would not qualify as an RS.
The Seacraft of Prehistory (1980) Johnstone. This book from 42 years ago is a little dated. I cannot find anything in it that supports the article text. If there is anything, a page number would help.
And The Dispersal of Austronesian boat forms in the Indian Ocean is a dead link.
Even if a case can be made that there was a sail in early Austronesian sailing technology that operated as a downwind sail (and therefore can be labelled "square"), I suggest that it is largely off-topic, as this article is about the entirely different technology. Trying to fit Austronesian content into the History section - especially when a date of 3000 BC is mentioned that is entirely unsupported by the latest sources.
There seems little alternative but to revert these edits pending their discussion by any who see any merit in them. ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 19:33, 20 June 2022 (UTC)
This article is about square rigs in contrast to fore-and-aft rigs. No, this article is about a particular rig, in the same way that, say, Gaff rig covers that subject. Where else in Wikipedia should this technology be discussed? It is a big subject in a (currently) highly deficient article. Consider the definition of the subject given in the lead.
The Lateen Sail in World History (1995) Campbell: starting page 11, illustration in p. 13.The only mention of square rig in this is: "Such a sail is functionally a "square" sail...". If does not say that it is a square sail, and the word square is in inverted commas. This seems a reference that is so tenuous that it does not meet the standards of an RS. It is certainly not the "
by definition" mentioned above.
"L" Indian Ocean Double-sprit sail. Square sail with two loose sprits. This is the Proto-Oceanic Spritsail (Bowen) of Ceylon, Arabia, and Madagascar, perhaps a primitive Austronesian rig, suitable for rafts and outrigger canoes.I am sorry that I have to say this, but reliance on this is a serious misreading of the source. This is Horridge laying out all the previous theories on how various rigs arose. He gives his own opinions later in the paper. Of particular note are "In fact Bowen's theories have been downright misleading" (I apologise for using bold text here, but this is key to Horridge's paper); "The difficulty is that a particular definition of a rig can apply to similar rigs that may not be related at all" and "Square sails and the fixed mast, both of which imply a rudder, spread eastwards from the Indian Ocean and possibly about 2000B.P.". The only use by Horridge of the word "square" in the part of the paper in which he gives his own ideas is, it appears, to denote a particular four sided shape and is not used as "square rig".
You're just worsening the WP:Systemic bias when it comes to our articles on sailing ships, which is ironic considering Austronesians developed it firstThe solution to the perceived systemic bias is in articles with a broader remit. The evidence of Austronesians being the first developers of square rig is not there. (No serious date is given in any of the work on Austronesian sailing technology for their downwind V shaped sail.) That does not mean that it is not the case - just that there is no evidence. There are works that suggest that the first humans to arrive in Australia, for instance, used sail – but these are (a) conjecture and (b) do not involve Austronesians. That debate has little to do with a specific maritime technology, namely square rig.
..where… should we discuss [other] square rigs…?Looking at the various articles that are already on Wikipedia, I suggest that an article like Austronesian maritime technology is a good place to start. That would be somewhere for other articles to link into for fuller coverage. In the meantime, this article needs a complete revision to cover its own subject adequately.
the definition of square rig is very clear….– strangely it is not. Different expert writers on the subject give different definitions. Perhaps part of the problem is that to anyone who works on or around a square rigged vessel, it is too commonplace a term to be worthy of definition. To pick some examples of the range: “square sail: four-sided sail, laced to a yard which generally lies square (at right angles) to the mast” (McGrail, Seán. Early Ships and Seafaring: Water Transport Beyond Europe (p. 249). (2015). Pen & Sword Books. ISBN: 978 1 47382 559 8.) This definition bears some consideration: what does “square to the mast” mean? What is intended is that when the mast is vertical, the yard is horizontal. Then we have: “A craft is said to be square rigged when she carries sails spread on yards whose position is athwartships when at rest” (Underhill, Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier (1946) – still quoted and cited by many as the definitive reference). Some refer to a “square rigged mast” – a sectional mast that has “tops”. (This makes sense when you compare with a topsail schooner’s foremast.) There is even a legal definition under the UK’s Merchant Shipping Acts. This determined the sort of certificate ship’s officers needed to be in command. (At a time when the UK merchant navy was easily the largest in the world, so influencing terminology.) Without droning on with lots more definitions, they all talk about sails suspended from yards. Your point
allowing it to sail only downwindis very far from the mark. Yes, fore and aft rig, generally can sail closer to the wind, but when rigs of the same date are compared, the difference is not huge. Square rig is definitely not limited to downwind use.
The Austronesian primitive V-shaped sail fits that definition– no, because the definition is a moving target (as above). What Campbell is trying to say is that it is a “downwind” sail. Do you have any significant number of sources that also says this? Horridge does not describe this V-shaped sail as a “square sail”. Where a 4 sided sail is hung from a yard that is supported at its centre point, that is a fit for many definitions of square rig.
we are only talking about European ships– No, the article is about any square rigged vessels. Many experts include under this heading ancient Egyptian, Phoenician, Greek, Viking examples, right through to the Indian square rigged ships of a good chunk of the last century. Where does this “European” thing come from. Square rigged vessels have been built and used in many countries on many continents. I worry that by “European” you may mean “not Austronesian”.
tenuous referencesThe Campbell reference seems pretty isolated to me. I cannot find anyone else who describes an inverted V sail with no mast as “square rigged”. If this description of the inverted V were a common concept, there would be multiple references. Without that, the concept should be regarded as a fringe idea.
I suggest that an article like Austronesian maritime technologyBut not on the general topics on sailing? Is it not a sail? Does it not fall into the two general categories of rigging? How does that help globalize the scope of this article (and others)? It's not like I'm hijacking the article. I'm simply saying they exist and they functionally fit the definition of a square rig. With sources. I could as easily argue that most of the content of this article could be moved to square-rigger. Since that is pretty much what it is actually discussing. Not square rigs in general, but square-rigged European ships.
Square rig is definitely not limited to downwind use.,
What Campbell is trying to say is that it is a “downwind” sail.
Where does this “European” thing come from.Read the article. Cog, barque, brig, barquentine, brigantine, ketch, schooner, sloop, windjammers. Topgallant, yard, Royal Navy, the different terms for masts. All the sources you are using. None of these things date before the 10th century AD. All of them are European. Including all the illustrations. There is zero discussion on the square rigs that are not European, again, aside from the history section which simply says "they exist". No mention of tripod or bipod-masted square-rigged ships, or ships with spars on the foot of the sails. Ships where the terms you are using, like "yards" and "yardarms" do not fit.
The Campbell reference seems pretty isolated to me.But it is a reference. I could remove everything else in the article and still have better referencing than you. There's not a lot of literature specifically on Austronesian sails and rigging. His is the most recent. And how do you dismiss Horridge and the previous authors he was discussing? Because he didn't specifically say "square rig"? "Square sail" is a synonym for "square rig", with the caveat that sometimes "square sails" do simply refer to a sail that is square, not to a type of rigging. It is a redirect to this article.
I am mystified by your frequent assertion that Austronesians invented sailing ships.Is this the real reason you're refusing to include it? I am mystified by the sheer resistance I find when I tell westerners that a people that didn't build empires or invented writing, sailed the seas earlier than them, using independently-discovered sailing technology. The disbelief that is almost insulting in its colonial haughtiness. Even with the sheer evidence of an ethnolinguistic group that spans the planet from Rapa Nui to Madagascar, from Taiwan to New Zealand, all with shared unique sailing technologies that don't exist in other cultures. But go ahead. Explain to me how Austronesians swam 2,550 kilometers of open ocean to the Marianas Islands in 1500 BC, simply because none of their ancient ships survived in the archaeological record after thousands of years (let's ignore the indigenous pre-contact sakman, while we're at it). Sailing ships in rivers, lakes, and shallow coastal areas existed long before Austronesian sailing of course. But that's not exactly what I mean, is it? Thor Heyerdahl had to invent a mythical magical white race to explain Polynesia, because he simply couldn't believe the "primitive" Polynesian ships could cross oceans against prevailing winds and currents. Again, the irony being that most western sailing ships today use multihull and crab claw sail technologies and techniques that Austronesians first developed. That is exactly the kind of condescending shit that presupposes the absence of direct evidence as equivalent to the absence of evidence that drove me to expand our articles on them. You act as if there are no reliable sources discussing these topics. Austronesians (and other non-European cultures) had sailing technologies. It is our job to cover them too. Not hide them behind excuses of them not fitting European sailing terminologies. -- OBSIDIAN† SOUL 06:42, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
Let’s try and get his back to basics. User:Obsidian Soul wants to include in the article the Austronesian sail that has been described (in the source given by Obsidian Soul) as the “Oceanic-southeast Asian Spritsail” (Oceanic spritsail). This was a primitive V shaped mastless sail that was used to travel downwind. The source in question is The Lateen Sail in World History by I.C. Campbell in Journal of World History Vol. 6, No. 1 (Spring, 1995), pp. 1-23 (23 pages) https://www.jstor.org/stable/20078617. This paper states :
Such a sail is functionally a "square" sail, although mostly they were V-shaped
(pg 13) The inverted commas around the word square are in the original paper.
The questions for a Wikipedia editor are:
(1) Was the intent of Campbell to convey that the Oceanic Spritsail is a square rig sail or to say it had a similar role? (Or anything else.)
(2) What do we infer from Campbell putting the word square in inverted commas?
(3) Do any other sources also characterise the Oceanic Spritsail as a square rig sail? This editor has looked for such sources, but found none.
(4) Is this description of an early type of Austronesian sail a reference in passing ( WP:CONTEXTMATTERS)? The main thrust of the article is, as per the title, about the Lateen sail.
(5) What particular credentials does Campbell have in the comparative study of sailing rigs? He appears, (from [4]) to work on the political history of Pacific islands.
(6) What are the characteristics of the Oceanic Spritsail that argue in favour of this being characterised as a type of square rig?
(a) It is a sail for downwind use. Square rig is advantageous for downwind sailing, but it also has good reaching performance and some windward capability (depending on the hull shape). Do these features of the two sails make them the same type of sail?
(b) There are a number of definitions of square rig – most talking about yards with sails suspended beneath them. The most favourable that I can find to the Oceanic Spritsail being a type of square rig is that square rig sails have a front and back surface and left (port) and right (starboard) edges, whilst fore and aft rig sails have left and right surfaces and front and back edges. (More simply, consider which surface the wind blows on – is it always the same one?) If you look for another sail that has a front and a back surface, you get the symmetrical spinnaker – as used on many modern yachts. This is another downwind sail. Does anyone call a spinnaker a square rig sail? A determined search has not found such usage. How does the existence of another downwind sail that fits a (minority) definition of square rig - but without being called “square rig” - affect the argument?
ThoughtIdRetired (
talk)
21:17, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
1) You're the one presuming a lot from just the use of quotation marks, as well as the one who was using the wrong term for it throughout ("Oceanic spritsail") even though you've claimed to have read the papers, and you're questioning my reading comprehension? The sentence reads that it is functionally a square sail. What other types of rigs are exclusively functionally square sails but are not square sails?
3) Your reading. I've literally given you the pages supporting their characterization of it as a square sail and direct quotes from their papers. Your excuses of them being "other authors' description" is nonsensical. If Horridge repeated them, it means he agreed with them. Nowhere in the paper does he say they are not square sails. The only thing you have that is even close is your presumptions on what the scare quotes mean. The burden of proof is on you.
5) Irrelevant. As I've said before, Campbell's paper is peer-reviewed (i.e. by people with far more credentials than us mere Wikipedia editors; second bullet point in WP:SCHOLARSHIP), and has been cited by other authors 54 times (fourth bullet point in WP:SCHOLARSHIP). Feel free to question the credentials of those other papers as well.
6) "A bold assertion" that is repeated in all sources I know and our own articles. I've asked you multiple times now what other general types of sailing rigs are there, and I will happily move it there. You have not responded with anything, even now.
Your analogy to taxonomy is nonsensical, sailing rigs are not classified by descent. If they were, the categories would have been based on which sails developed from which.
The fore-and-aft rig is defined primarily by its position in relation to the keel, all other characteristics are secondary and optional. So why do you insist on a very specific definition for square rigs when its primary definition is also its position relative to the keel? You know, the thing that actually differentiates it from fore-and-aft rigs? Not on whether it is hung from a yard, or how many masts support it, or even the shape of the sail itself. Those secondary characteristics vary by source. They are found in many definitions, 'but not all.' Which shows they're not the primary characteristic. Again, the position of the sail relative to the keel (perpendicular) is the one universal definition of the square rig that is found in all sources. And the V-shaped square sail fits that.
Austronesian (not just Oceanic) sail types are all fore-and-aft rigs, again with the exception of the V-shaped double sprit. Your assertion that Austronesian sails "do not readily fit in with the sail classifications of other parts of the world" is false.
That is the definition we should follow for WP:Globalize reasons. So we can include more square rigs here, rather than just European ones, as I've pointed out multiple times. None of the other square rigs from non-European ships fit your narrow definition. Does that mean they are not square rigs? Is the picture of an Ancient Egyptian square rig that you've also removed, not a square rig? It does not fit the article's descriptions of what a square rig is at all. It is not hung from a yard, it had another spar at the foot of the sail, and it collapses downwards when not in use.
The deficiencies of the article as it stands is exactly why I'm questioning your removal of rigs that are not European, while retaining the unsourced 90% specifically only discussing European ships in the Age of Sail. You have made zero indication of even understanding the WP:BIAS problem that the article possesses now in its coverage of what should have been a very general topic. My suggestion has been to separate it into subsections dealing with different shipbuilding traditions, if you don't want it confusing the readers. That way you can discuss specifically European terms for their version of the square rig without it implying that it was universal. But again, WP:GLOBALIZE it. -- OBSIDIAN† SOUL 09:19, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
References
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"Square rig was the main design in the age of sail, (1571—1863)." I removed this line because I cannot understand what it means. The largest vessels were all square-rigged during the period, but I'd be surprised to hear that even the majority of vessels of any time were square-rigged. Czrisher 15:42, 10 August 2007 (UTC) The square rig is atleast as good as the gaff rig even when sailing windward, but require more experienced crew for the same perfomance then other rigs. I'm however not experienced with sailing other rigs then these two...(not realy experienced with these either, only sailed a few months in square a riged sailing ship and only training sailing in gaff riged sailing ship) Anyways, I say this because I know that a ship from the sailing school I was on not to long ago fosen folkehøyskole have outsailed gaff riged ships on several ocations. The square rig don't have a mast infront of the sail that cause turbulence in the wind like the gaff sail. I don't want to edit the article without better proves then my own(rather limited) experiance. I hope atleast someone here is willing to consider either editing or atlest finding more information on the subject. If I'm wrong, me being only a student in sailing and stuff, I'd like to know, and I'd like more information about why you people belive I'm wrong. Luredreier 23:23, 22 September 2007 (UTC)
As I could not manage on Old revision of User_talk:Facius maybe someone can help me here: Facius updated "Square Rig" with the definition A ship at least partially so rigged is called a square rigger. In the german wiki we have a discussion about this, maybe somebody has source. O has it just been the resume of the article? -- CeGe ( talk) 07:39, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
"Principally square rigged types A barque ... A brig ... A full rigged ship ... A sloop has only one mast."
Oh, really? A sloop is a "principally square rigged type"? No. A sloop is, by definition, fore-and-aft rigged. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.68.134.1 ( talk) 21:31, 13 January 2010 (UTC)
should the link to Single square sail ship be pointed to Cog_(ship) instead?
academic articles use cog as a blanket term for the single-masted square-rig.
Longpinkytoes ( talk) 17:08, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
The Austronesian content added in the edits starting with [2] do not seem to be supported by the sources given. Even if they are, they describe an entirely different technology than the subject of the article.
The evolution of pacific canoe rigs (1986) Horridge. This paper is very tentative about the "spritsail" rigs of the region. The author uses the word "perhaps" with the first mention of the Indian Ocean Double Sprit Sail. Discussion by the author of rafts equipped with square sails is clearly speculative - at least that is how the author has written it. Horridge's dating of use of sail by Austronesians is stated more clearly in his later paper in The Austronesians: Historical and Comparative Perspectives states that they had sails "some time before 2000 BC". He makes no mention of "square" sails at all, apart from mention of "square rigged ships" and the sail on Kon-Tiki (and experiment that he discounts). Any editor using this reference to support the article text in question needs to explain exactly how it does so. Such explanation should not rely on the paper explaining theories that are not supported by the author.
The Lateen Sail in World History (1995) Campbell. Whilst this paper includes discussion of the triangular sail in question, it gives no firm opinion as to its date of origin. Nor does it attribute it to development by Austronesians.
Maritime Southeast Asia to 1500. I do not have a copy of this book. However, an online review states that: "the book contains many errors of fact, misleading simplifications of material, and references that are frequently inadequate, inappropriate or outdated." [3] That suggests that it would not qualify as an RS.
The Seacraft of Prehistory (1980) Johnstone. This book from 42 years ago is a little dated. I cannot find anything in it that supports the article text. If there is anything, a page number would help.
And The Dispersal of Austronesian boat forms in the Indian Ocean is a dead link.
Even if a case can be made that there was a sail in early Austronesian sailing technology that operated as a downwind sail (and therefore can be labelled "square"), I suggest that it is largely off-topic, as this article is about the entirely different technology. Trying to fit Austronesian content into the History section - especially when a date of 3000 BC is mentioned that is entirely unsupported by the latest sources.
There seems little alternative but to revert these edits pending their discussion by any who see any merit in them. ThoughtIdRetired ( talk) 19:33, 20 June 2022 (UTC)
This article is about square rigs in contrast to fore-and-aft rigs. No, this article is about a particular rig, in the same way that, say, Gaff rig covers that subject. Where else in Wikipedia should this technology be discussed? It is a big subject in a (currently) highly deficient article. Consider the definition of the subject given in the lead.
The Lateen Sail in World History (1995) Campbell: starting page 11, illustration in p. 13.The only mention of square rig in this is: "Such a sail is functionally a "square" sail...". If does not say that it is a square sail, and the word square is in inverted commas. This seems a reference that is so tenuous that it does not meet the standards of an RS. It is certainly not the "
by definition" mentioned above.
"L" Indian Ocean Double-sprit sail. Square sail with two loose sprits. This is the Proto-Oceanic Spritsail (Bowen) of Ceylon, Arabia, and Madagascar, perhaps a primitive Austronesian rig, suitable for rafts and outrigger canoes.I am sorry that I have to say this, but reliance on this is a serious misreading of the source. This is Horridge laying out all the previous theories on how various rigs arose. He gives his own opinions later in the paper. Of particular note are "In fact Bowen's theories have been downright misleading" (I apologise for using bold text here, but this is key to Horridge's paper); "The difficulty is that a particular definition of a rig can apply to similar rigs that may not be related at all" and "Square sails and the fixed mast, both of which imply a rudder, spread eastwards from the Indian Ocean and possibly about 2000B.P.". The only use by Horridge of the word "square" in the part of the paper in which he gives his own ideas is, it appears, to denote a particular four sided shape and is not used as "square rig".
You're just worsening the WP:Systemic bias when it comes to our articles on sailing ships, which is ironic considering Austronesians developed it firstThe solution to the perceived systemic bias is in articles with a broader remit. The evidence of Austronesians being the first developers of square rig is not there. (No serious date is given in any of the work on Austronesian sailing technology for their downwind V shaped sail.) That does not mean that it is not the case - just that there is no evidence. There are works that suggest that the first humans to arrive in Australia, for instance, used sail – but these are (a) conjecture and (b) do not involve Austronesians. That debate has little to do with a specific maritime technology, namely square rig.
..where… should we discuss [other] square rigs…?Looking at the various articles that are already on Wikipedia, I suggest that an article like Austronesian maritime technology is a good place to start. That would be somewhere for other articles to link into for fuller coverage. In the meantime, this article needs a complete revision to cover its own subject adequately.
the definition of square rig is very clear….– strangely it is not. Different expert writers on the subject give different definitions. Perhaps part of the problem is that to anyone who works on or around a square rigged vessel, it is too commonplace a term to be worthy of definition. To pick some examples of the range: “square sail: four-sided sail, laced to a yard which generally lies square (at right angles) to the mast” (McGrail, Seán. Early Ships and Seafaring: Water Transport Beyond Europe (p. 249). (2015). Pen & Sword Books. ISBN: 978 1 47382 559 8.) This definition bears some consideration: what does “square to the mast” mean? What is intended is that when the mast is vertical, the yard is horizontal. Then we have: “A craft is said to be square rigged when she carries sails spread on yards whose position is athwartships when at rest” (Underhill, Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier (1946) – still quoted and cited by many as the definitive reference). Some refer to a “square rigged mast” – a sectional mast that has “tops”. (This makes sense when you compare with a topsail schooner’s foremast.) There is even a legal definition under the UK’s Merchant Shipping Acts. This determined the sort of certificate ship’s officers needed to be in command. (At a time when the UK merchant navy was easily the largest in the world, so influencing terminology.) Without droning on with lots more definitions, they all talk about sails suspended from yards. Your point
allowing it to sail only downwindis very far from the mark. Yes, fore and aft rig, generally can sail closer to the wind, but when rigs of the same date are compared, the difference is not huge. Square rig is definitely not limited to downwind use.
The Austronesian primitive V-shaped sail fits that definition– no, because the definition is a moving target (as above). What Campbell is trying to say is that it is a “downwind” sail. Do you have any significant number of sources that also says this? Horridge does not describe this V-shaped sail as a “square sail”. Where a 4 sided sail is hung from a yard that is supported at its centre point, that is a fit for many definitions of square rig.
we are only talking about European ships– No, the article is about any square rigged vessels. Many experts include under this heading ancient Egyptian, Phoenician, Greek, Viking examples, right through to the Indian square rigged ships of a good chunk of the last century. Where does this “European” thing come from. Square rigged vessels have been built and used in many countries on many continents. I worry that by “European” you may mean “not Austronesian”.
tenuous referencesThe Campbell reference seems pretty isolated to me. I cannot find anyone else who describes an inverted V sail with no mast as “square rigged”. If this description of the inverted V were a common concept, there would be multiple references. Without that, the concept should be regarded as a fringe idea.
I suggest that an article like Austronesian maritime technologyBut not on the general topics on sailing? Is it not a sail? Does it not fall into the two general categories of rigging? How does that help globalize the scope of this article (and others)? It's not like I'm hijacking the article. I'm simply saying they exist and they functionally fit the definition of a square rig. With sources. I could as easily argue that most of the content of this article could be moved to square-rigger. Since that is pretty much what it is actually discussing. Not square rigs in general, but square-rigged European ships.
Square rig is definitely not limited to downwind use.,
What Campbell is trying to say is that it is a “downwind” sail.
Where does this “European” thing come from.Read the article. Cog, barque, brig, barquentine, brigantine, ketch, schooner, sloop, windjammers. Topgallant, yard, Royal Navy, the different terms for masts. All the sources you are using. None of these things date before the 10th century AD. All of them are European. Including all the illustrations. There is zero discussion on the square rigs that are not European, again, aside from the history section which simply says "they exist". No mention of tripod or bipod-masted square-rigged ships, or ships with spars on the foot of the sails. Ships where the terms you are using, like "yards" and "yardarms" do not fit.
The Campbell reference seems pretty isolated to me.But it is a reference. I could remove everything else in the article and still have better referencing than you. There's not a lot of literature specifically on Austronesian sails and rigging. His is the most recent. And how do you dismiss Horridge and the previous authors he was discussing? Because he didn't specifically say "square rig"? "Square sail" is a synonym for "square rig", with the caveat that sometimes "square sails" do simply refer to a sail that is square, not to a type of rigging. It is a redirect to this article.
I am mystified by your frequent assertion that Austronesians invented sailing ships.Is this the real reason you're refusing to include it? I am mystified by the sheer resistance I find when I tell westerners that a people that didn't build empires or invented writing, sailed the seas earlier than them, using independently-discovered sailing technology. The disbelief that is almost insulting in its colonial haughtiness. Even with the sheer evidence of an ethnolinguistic group that spans the planet from Rapa Nui to Madagascar, from Taiwan to New Zealand, all with shared unique sailing technologies that don't exist in other cultures. But go ahead. Explain to me how Austronesians swam 2,550 kilometers of open ocean to the Marianas Islands in 1500 BC, simply because none of their ancient ships survived in the archaeological record after thousands of years (let's ignore the indigenous pre-contact sakman, while we're at it). Sailing ships in rivers, lakes, and shallow coastal areas existed long before Austronesian sailing of course. But that's not exactly what I mean, is it? Thor Heyerdahl had to invent a mythical magical white race to explain Polynesia, because he simply couldn't believe the "primitive" Polynesian ships could cross oceans against prevailing winds and currents. Again, the irony being that most western sailing ships today use multihull and crab claw sail technologies and techniques that Austronesians first developed. That is exactly the kind of condescending shit that presupposes the absence of direct evidence as equivalent to the absence of evidence that drove me to expand our articles on them. You act as if there are no reliable sources discussing these topics. Austronesians (and other non-European cultures) had sailing technologies. It is our job to cover them too. Not hide them behind excuses of them not fitting European sailing terminologies. -- OBSIDIAN† SOUL 06:42, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
Let’s try and get his back to basics. User:Obsidian Soul wants to include in the article the Austronesian sail that has been described (in the source given by Obsidian Soul) as the “Oceanic-southeast Asian Spritsail” (Oceanic spritsail). This was a primitive V shaped mastless sail that was used to travel downwind. The source in question is The Lateen Sail in World History by I.C. Campbell in Journal of World History Vol. 6, No. 1 (Spring, 1995), pp. 1-23 (23 pages) https://www.jstor.org/stable/20078617. This paper states :
Such a sail is functionally a "square" sail, although mostly they were V-shaped
(pg 13) The inverted commas around the word square are in the original paper.
The questions for a Wikipedia editor are:
(1) Was the intent of Campbell to convey that the Oceanic Spritsail is a square rig sail or to say it had a similar role? (Or anything else.)
(2) What do we infer from Campbell putting the word square in inverted commas?
(3) Do any other sources also characterise the Oceanic Spritsail as a square rig sail? This editor has looked for such sources, but found none.
(4) Is this description of an early type of Austronesian sail a reference in passing ( WP:CONTEXTMATTERS)? The main thrust of the article is, as per the title, about the Lateen sail.
(5) What particular credentials does Campbell have in the comparative study of sailing rigs? He appears, (from [4]) to work on the political history of Pacific islands.
(6) What are the characteristics of the Oceanic Spritsail that argue in favour of this being characterised as a type of square rig?
(a) It is a sail for downwind use. Square rig is advantageous for downwind sailing, but it also has good reaching performance and some windward capability (depending on the hull shape). Do these features of the two sails make them the same type of sail?
(b) There are a number of definitions of square rig – most talking about yards with sails suspended beneath them. The most favourable that I can find to the Oceanic Spritsail being a type of square rig is that square rig sails have a front and back surface and left (port) and right (starboard) edges, whilst fore and aft rig sails have left and right surfaces and front and back edges. (More simply, consider which surface the wind blows on – is it always the same one?) If you look for another sail that has a front and a back surface, you get the symmetrical spinnaker – as used on many modern yachts. This is another downwind sail. Does anyone call a spinnaker a square rig sail? A determined search has not found such usage. How does the existence of another downwind sail that fits a (minority) definition of square rig - but without being called “square rig” - affect the argument?
ThoughtIdRetired (
talk)
21:17, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
1) You're the one presuming a lot from just the use of quotation marks, as well as the one who was using the wrong term for it throughout ("Oceanic spritsail") even though you've claimed to have read the papers, and you're questioning my reading comprehension? The sentence reads that it is functionally a square sail. What other types of rigs are exclusively functionally square sails but are not square sails?
3) Your reading. I've literally given you the pages supporting their characterization of it as a square sail and direct quotes from their papers. Your excuses of them being "other authors' description" is nonsensical. If Horridge repeated them, it means he agreed with them. Nowhere in the paper does he say they are not square sails. The only thing you have that is even close is your presumptions on what the scare quotes mean. The burden of proof is on you.
5) Irrelevant. As I've said before, Campbell's paper is peer-reviewed (i.e. by people with far more credentials than us mere Wikipedia editors; second bullet point in WP:SCHOLARSHIP), and has been cited by other authors 54 times (fourth bullet point in WP:SCHOLARSHIP). Feel free to question the credentials of those other papers as well.
6) "A bold assertion" that is repeated in all sources I know and our own articles. I've asked you multiple times now what other general types of sailing rigs are there, and I will happily move it there. You have not responded with anything, even now.
Your analogy to taxonomy is nonsensical, sailing rigs are not classified by descent. If they were, the categories would have been based on which sails developed from which.
The fore-and-aft rig is defined primarily by its position in relation to the keel, all other characteristics are secondary and optional. So why do you insist on a very specific definition for square rigs when its primary definition is also its position relative to the keel? You know, the thing that actually differentiates it from fore-and-aft rigs? Not on whether it is hung from a yard, or how many masts support it, or even the shape of the sail itself. Those secondary characteristics vary by source. They are found in many definitions, 'but not all.' Which shows they're not the primary characteristic. Again, the position of the sail relative to the keel (perpendicular) is the one universal definition of the square rig that is found in all sources. And the V-shaped square sail fits that.
Austronesian (not just Oceanic) sail types are all fore-and-aft rigs, again with the exception of the V-shaped double sprit. Your assertion that Austronesian sails "do not readily fit in with the sail classifications of other parts of the world" is false.
That is the definition we should follow for WP:Globalize reasons. So we can include more square rigs here, rather than just European ones, as I've pointed out multiple times. None of the other square rigs from non-European ships fit your narrow definition. Does that mean they are not square rigs? Is the picture of an Ancient Egyptian square rig that you've also removed, not a square rig? It does not fit the article's descriptions of what a square rig is at all. It is not hung from a yard, it had another spar at the foot of the sail, and it collapses downwards when not in use.
The deficiencies of the article as it stands is exactly why I'm questioning your removal of rigs that are not European, while retaining the unsourced 90% specifically only discussing European ships in the Age of Sail. You have made zero indication of even understanding the WP:BIAS problem that the article possesses now in its coverage of what should have been a very general topic. My suggestion has been to separate it into subsections dealing with different shipbuilding traditions, if you don't want it confusing the readers. That way you can discuss specifically European terms for their version of the square rig without it implying that it was universal. But again, WP:GLOBALIZE it. -- OBSIDIAN† SOUL 09:19, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
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