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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
ON NT ED IZEVAL WAR-GALLEYS
J`
of Donata's tenements as standing on the Rio (presumably that
of S. Giovanni Grisostomo) on one side, opening by certain
porticoes and stairs on the other to the Court and common
alley leading to the Church of S. Giovanni Grisostomo, and
abutting in two places on the CA' POLO, the property of her
husband and Stefano, will apply perfectly to a building occupy-
ing the western portion of the area on which now stands the
Theatre, and perhaps forming the western side of a Court of
which Casa Polo formed the other three sides.*
We-know nothing more of Polo till we find him appearing
a year or two later in rapid succession as the Captain of a
Venetian Galley, as a prisoner of war, and as an author.
V. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE WAR-GALLEYS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN STATES IN THE MIDDLE AGES.
25. And before entering on this new phase of the Traveller's
biography it may not be without interest that we say Arrange-
something regarding the equipment y
uipment of those galleys ment of the
~1 t' g Rowers in
which are so prominent in the medieval history of the Gad ys: a
Mediterranean.- separate oar
to every
Eschewing that " Serbonian Bog, where armies man.
whole have sunk " of Books and Commentators, the theory
of the classification of the Biremes and Triremes of the
Ancients, we can at least assert on secure grounds that in
medi 'val armament, up to the middle of the 16th century or
thereabouts, the characteristic distinction of galleys of different
calibres, so far as such differences existed, was based on the
number of rowels that sat on one bench pulling each his separate
oar, but through one portella or rowlockport.+ And to the classes
•
* See Appendix C, No. i b.
t I regret not to have had access to Jal's learned memoirs (Archéologie Navale, Paris, 1839) whilst writing this section, nor since, except for a hasty look at his Essay on the difficult subject of the oar arrangements. I see that he rejects so great a number of oars as I deduce from the statements of Sanudo and others, and that he regards a large number of the rowers as supplementary.
$ It seems the more desirable to elucidate this, because writers on mediaeval subjects so accomplished as Buchon and Capmany have (it would seem) entirely misconceived the matter, assuming that all the men on one bench pulled at one oar.
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