PHARAOH NECHO ships 600 B.C.

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aukepalmhof
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PHARAOH NECHO ships 600 B.C.

Post by aukepalmhof » Tue Mar 20, 2018 7:55 pm

Somewhere between the years 610 and 594 B.C. some Phœnician ships, acting under instructions from Pharaoh Necho, who reigned from 612-596 BC, are said to have circumnavigated Africa, having proceeded from the Indian to the Southern Ocean, and thence round by the Atlantic and through the Pillars of Hercules home. The voyage occupied more than two years, a circumstance which was due to the fact that they always landed in the autumn and sowed a tract of country with corn, and waited on shore till it was fit to cut. In the time of Solomon the joint fleets of the Israelites and Phœnicians made voyages from the head of the Red Sea down the coasts of Arabia and Eastern Africa, and even to Persia and Beluchistan, and probably also to India. The Phœnicians were not only great traders themselves, but they manned the fleets of other nations, and built ships for other peoples, notably for the Egyptians and Persians. It is unfortunate that we have so few representations of the Phœnician ships, but we are justified in concluding that they were of the same general type as those which were used by the Greeks, the Carthaginians, and eventually by the Romans. The representations of their vessels known to be in existence were found by the late Sir Austin Layard in the palace built by King Sennacherib at Kouyunjik, near Nineveh, about 700 B.C. Though they were obviously rather symbols of ships than faithful representations, we can, nevertheless, gather from them that the warship was a galley provided with a ram, and fitted with a mast carrying a single square sail; there were also two banks of oars on each side. The steering was accomplished by two large oars at the stern, and the fighting troops were carried on a deck or platform raised on pillars above the heads of the rowers.

The vessel depict on the stamp is an Egyptian vessel from around 1600 BC and not one from around 600 BC see: http://www.shipstamps.co.uk/forum/viewt ... hip#p16144
Source: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/33098/33 ... tm#Page_27
Uganda 1989 150s sg 765, scott722
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