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IFrFOcia cVMtVraM •
culture and heritage
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Steamboat.
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1914. /
Ancon,the
firstboattocross
thePanamaCanal
in1914.
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VOHSBOBWBODF
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Thetwentieth
centuryoffereda
breakthroughin
navigation.
After the Iberians, it was the Dutch and the French
who started their own naval development, which led
their ships to set sail for North America, Asia and Af-
rica during the seventeenth century. By the hand of
their merchant marine, with increasingly larger and
more powerful ships, over the following centuries the
Europeans took over the globe, carrying their flags
and their products to the most remote corners, while
China and Japan, their most powerful rivals in Asia,
decided to withdraw from the world, breaking their
trade links and ending theirmerchant development.
Inthisjourney,theeighteenthandnineteenthcen-
turiescertainlybelongtoGreatBritainwhom,thanksto
its merchant fleet, built the largest empire that’s ever
been known. At the same time, the British put science
at the service of their commercial development. Before
navalclocks(chronometers),itwasverydifficulttonav-
igate for long distances with any accuracy. However,
the position of a ship at sea could be determined with
reasonable accuracy if a navigator could refer to a clock
that lost or gained less thanabout 10 secondsper day.
The marine chronometer keeps the time of a
fixed location, allowing mariners to determine
longitude by comparing the local high noon
to the clock. The British government offered a
large prize of £20,000, equivalent to millions of
pounds today, for anyone who could determine
longitude accurately. The reward was eventually
claimed in 1761 by a simple carpenter from York-
shire, John Harrison.
Another big step will be the invention - in the
eighteenth century - of the steam engine, which
will soon be perfected to be placed on ships. With
this, the nineteenth century will see the emer-
gence of larger and faster ships that will close the
gap significantly. With steam, wind it does not
matter, because ships can move independently
of it even in calmer waters. This, of course, also
marked the end of the suffering rowers. Only
the Clipper, a narrow and elongated sailing ship,
which made it very fast, managed to survive until
the early twentieth century.
7
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