* Milton Waddams wrote
With everyone going on about Roman, Phoenician and Egyptian sailors
one would think they invented sailing. The greatest sailors were the
Polynesians. They had the fastest boats and ranged over the greatest
area of sea. They were also the best navigators, all without compass,
astrolabs and telescopes.

Uh huh. So, if they were such great sailors then why did they not
continue to make progress with their vessels and open trade routes to
the other civilizations on the continents?



Jeff wrote:
I certainly wouldn't argue with the nomination of the Polynesians as
#1.

I would.

They made some great voyages, true. But how many of their navigators
got lost at sea? About half, maybe more? All we know is that a couple
of great canoes did make successful voyages across long stretches of
the Pacific. I would suggest that for every one that made it, there
was at least one other that didn't. And they did not continue to
progress toward longer & more successful voyages. They made some
migrations among the islands and called it a day.

OTOH with all the beautiful Polynesian women on the island why would a
sane man leave home to go voyaging anyway?



..... But, you should also give credit to the Norse, as well as their
predecessors (some call them the Albans) who sailed the North Seas to
Iceland, Greenland, and Newfoundland, originally in hide covered
boats. Up there, of course, a compass wasn't much good.


They also covered a good part of the Cathay trade route via the
Russian rivers. That's how they came to the attention of the Byzantine
Emperor who recruited Vikings for his personal bodyguard.

And also the Basque were probably fishing off New England a hundred
years before Columbus.

Yep.

Getting back to the Phoenicians & Romans, how about Hanno's
circumnavigation of Africa?

Fresh Breezes- Doug King