Science Forums 2

[carlton-temple]

I think the average "academic" historian lacks the practical experience of how rapidly ships and horses ect, could cover great distances and so finds it difficult to appreciate how quickly information could be passed from here to there. For example, a small sailing yacht can get from England to America in a couple of months. A Brixam fishing boat with a good wind could make 18 miles /hour. One of Napoleons generals made the round trip by post coach back and forth from Paris to Rome in a long weekend. In the museum in Groningen (Holland), there are many log-bocks from Dutch barges that rounded the Horn without compasses as they were to expensive. There are it appears possible indications that the Phoneticians visited Australia on a regular basis, the Viking boats could make Scottland in 36 hours and so on. All of which shows that through out history much more intercommunication has existed than is recorded. As a retired wooden ship builder the techniques "still" used to assemble wooden ships are lost in the mists of time, the trunel, a sort of wooden nail, easy to make may be as old as mankind. Two experienced men can build a 7metre boat in a week in split oak! To say that a "technique" or area of "knowledge" remained long isolated in any one place for long is a thus a little exaggerated. One only has to read Herodotus, to see how quickly and far he could travel. Take the Harappas peoples, sailing back and forth to Asia could of been a regular affair, certainly their distinctive pottery has turned up all over the place.