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A historian and sailor describes how 16th-century voyages from England to the Americas were made
When a ship set out for the Americas in the 16th century, the crew faced a long voyage and a host of difficulties along the way. Ship-building, navigation, and provisioning were all crucial to the vessel actually arriving in the New World, which was by no means guaranteed. In order to reach her destination, both skill and luck played vital roles. By examining a host of original documents, including especially logs of voyages, historian and sailor James Seay Dean has been able to construct a detailed nautical history of this early period of English exploration of the Americas, when attention was still focused primarily on the Tropics. He looks at how the ships were built, how they were navigated in an age before even sextants, let alone GPS, and what life was like for the crews aboard them. This is an important book for anyone with an interest in the history of colonialism, as well as of ships and the sea.