Lilia Campana, INA Research Associate
In ancient times the quiqueremis, or quinquereme, was a technological improvement on the earlier trireme, with five men at each oar to increase the speed and power of the war galley. With the fall of the Roman Empire, however, the knowledge of how to build the quinquereme disappeared—that is, apparently, until a professor of Greek in Venice named Vettor Fausto (ca. 1480-1541) managed to resurrect the quinquereme from a deep knowledge of Greek and Latin mathematicians’ texts, despite the fact that he was not even a skilled shipwright. The Arsenal of Venice built several galleys “a la Fausto,” the last of which was meant to be the flagship of Marc’Antonio Colonna in the battle of Lepanto (1571). However, no archaeological remains of the quinquereme—from the ancient or Renaissance period—have survived to this day.
In order to better understand Fausto’s achievement and how the quinquereme was built, I am focusing my research on one of the most intriguing aspects in the history of Renaissance naval architecture: the development of the Marina Architectura, a geometrical shipbuilding method that has its origins from a deep knowledge of Greek and Latin mathematicians’ texts. My primary field of investigation is archival research, which in the summer of 2008 was carried out in Venice, primarily in the State Archive, but also in the Marciana Library and in the Library of the Correr Museum.
From May 28 to August 11, I found and transcribed more than 300 unpublished documents, as well as the 16th-century naval treatise Misure di vascelli di…proto dell’Arsenale di Venetia, which highlights important questions about Venetian shipbuilding practice. All of these manuscripts and the above mentioned naval manuscript will be included in my Texas A&M Nautical Archaeology Program master’s thesis titled “Vettor Fausto: a Professor of Greek in Venice. A New Light on the Manuscript Misure di vascelli di…proto dell’Arsenale di Venetia.” (May 2009) The technical aspects of the quinquereme are currently being studied under the supervision of Mauro Bondioli, whose research has been critical for the study of the Italian shipbuilding and seafaring.
In addition, many other documents not specifically related to my research topic—but of much interest to historians of naval architecture—came to light, including several folios regarding four Venetian shipwrights in the early 17th century who were accused by the Inquisitors of Venice of having sold some galley drawings (disegni) to the King of Spain. These are the earliest mentions of line drawings yet known.