The Veneti, Already Mentioned As Celebrated For Their Ships, Built Them Of Oak; But Theirs Are The Only Vessels Of Antiquity That Seem To Have Been Constructed Of This Kind Of Wood.

The timber was so little seasoned, that a considerable number of ships are recorded as having been completely built and equipped in thirty days, after the timber was cut down in the forest.

In the time of the Trojan war, no iron was used in the building of ships; the planks were fastened to the ribs with cords.

In the most ancient accounts of the Grecian ships, the only mode by which we can form a conjecture of their size, is from the number of men they were capable of holding. At the siege of Troy, Homer describes the ships of the Beotians as the largest; and they carried, he says, one hundred and twenty men. As Thucydides informs us that at this period soldiers served as rowers, the number mentioned by Homer must comprehend all the ship could conveniently accommodate. In general the Roman trading vessels were very small. Cicero represents those that could hold two thousand amphorae, or about sixty tons, as very large; there were, however, occasionally enormous ships built: one of the most remarkable for size was that of Ptolemy; it was four hundred and twenty feet long, and if it were broad and deep in proportion, its burden must have been upwards of seven thousand tons, more than three times the burden of one of our first rates; but it is probable that it was both flat bottomed and narrow.

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