With Respect To Vessels Of Four Rudders, As Two Are Described As
Being Fixed To The Sides, It Is Probable
That these resembled in their
construction and object the pieces of wood attached to the sides of small
Dutch vessels
And barges on the Thames, and generally all vessels that are
flat-bottomed, for the purpose of preventing them from making much _lee
way_, when they are _working_ against the wind.
The first anchors were not made of iron, but of stone, or even of wood;
these were loaded with lead. According to Diodorus, the Phoenicians, in
their first voyages to Spain, having obtained more silver than their ships
could safely hold, employed some of it, instead of lead, for their anchors.
Very anciently the anchor had only one fluke. Anacharsis is said to have
invented an anchor with two. Sometimes baskets full of stones, and sacks
filled with sand, were employed as anchors. Every ship had two anchors, one
of which was never used, except in cases of great danger: it was larger
than the other, and was called the sacred anchor. At the period of the
Argonautic expedition, it does not appear that anchors of any kind but
stone were known; though the scholiast upon Apollonius Rhodius, quite at
variance with the testimony of this author, mentions anchors of iron with
two flukes. It has been supposed that anchors were not used by the Grecian
fleet at the siege of Troy, because "the Greek word which is used to mean
an anchor, properly so called, is not used in any of the poems of Homer."
It is certain that iron anchors were not then known; but it is equally
certain that large stones were used as anchors.
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