But why should I now dwell upon the sides of the ships, which were not only painted with ornate colors but were covered with gold and silver figures?...The blue water, smitten by many oars ...

The genesis of the word starboard comes from the days long before there was even a rudder on a ship. This is when sailors used a steering oar. It's a combination of two Old English words ...

And no, slaves weren’t normally used as there simply wasn’t space. Oars weren’t all the same length. On one ship, oars were found to range from 17-19 feet in length. This was to accommodate ...

Without this crucial advance in ship technology, the Vikings would never ... They could cross the open oceans under sail and then switch to oars for lightning-fast hit-and-run attacks on ...