![Sail plan barque](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2d/Sail_plan_barque.svg)
A barque, barc, or bark is a type of
sailing vessel
A sailing ship is a sea-going vessel that uses sails mounted on masts to harness the power of wind and propel the vessel. There is a variety of sail plans that propel sailing ships, employing square-rigged or fore-and-aft sails. Some ships ...
with three or more
masts having the fore- and mainmasts
rigged square and only the mizzen (the aftmost mast)
rigged fore and aft. Sometimes, the mizzen is only partly fore-and-aft rigged, bearing a square-rigged sail above.
Etymology
![Sedov in TSR at Kotka July 2017 2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f8/Sedov_in_TSR_at_Kotka_July_2017_2.jpg)
The word "barque" entered English via the French term, which in turn came from the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
''barca'' by way of
Occitan Occitan may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to the Occitania territory in parts of France, Italy, Monaco and Spain.
* Something of, from, or related to the Occitania administrative region of France.
* Occitan language
Occitan (; o ...
,
Catalan
Catalan may refer to:
Catalonia
From, or related to Catalonia:
* Catalan language, a Romance language
* Catalans, an ethnic group formed by the people from, or with origins in, Northern or southern Catalonia
Places
* 13178 Catalan, asteroid #1 ...
, Spanish, or Italian.
The Latin ''barca'' may stem from
Celtic
Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to:
Language and ethnicity
*pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia
**Celts (modern)
*Celtic languages
**Proto-Celtic language
* Celtic music
*Celtic nations
Sports Fo ...
''barc'' (per
Thurneysen) or Greek ''baris'' (per
Diez), a term for an Egyptian boat. The ''
Oxford English Dictionary
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
'', however, considers the latter improbable.
The word ''barc'' appears to have come from Celtic languages. The form adopted by English, perhaps from
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
, was "bark", while that adopted by Latin as ''barca'' very early, which gave rise to the French ''barge'' and ''barque''.
In Latin, Spanish, and Italian, the term ''barca'' refers to a small
boat
A boat is a watercraft of a large range of types and sizes, but generally smaller than a ship, which is distinguished by its larger size, shape, cargo or passenger capacity, or its ability to carry boats.
Small boats are typically found on inl ...
, not a full-sized ship. French influence in England led to the use in English of both words, although their meanings now are not the same.
Well before the 19th century, a
barge
Barge nowadays generally refers to a flat-bottomed inland waterway vessel which does not have its own means of mechanical propulsion. The first modern barges were pulled by tugs, but nowadays most are pushed by pusher boats, or other vessels ...
had become interpreted as a small vessel of coastal or inland waters, or a fast rowing boat carried by warships and normally reserved for the commanding officer. Somewhat later, a bark became a sailing vessel of a distinctive rig as detailed below. In Britain, by the mid-19th century, the spelling had taken on the French form of ''barque''. Although
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon led the advancement of both ...
used this form of the word as early as 1592, Shakespeare still used the spelling "barke" in
Sonnet 116
William Shakespeare's sonnet 116 was first published in 1609. Its structure and form are a typical example of the Shakespearean sonnet.
The poet begins by stating he does not object to the "marriage of true minds", but maintains that love is not ...
in 1609. Throughout the period of sail, the word was used also as a shortening of the
barca-longa
A barca-longa (1600s, also barqua-; 1600s–1700s barco-longo) was a two- or three-masted lugger used near the coasts of Spain and Portugal, and more widely in the Mediterranean Sea. Barca-longas were used in Spain and Portugal for fishing, and we ...
of the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ea ...
.
The usual spelling convention is that, to distinguish between
homophone
A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same (to varying extent) as another word but differs in meaning. A ''homophone'' may also differ in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (p ...
s, when spelled as barque it refers to a ship, and when spelled as bark it refers to either a
sound
In physics, sound is a vibration that propagates as an acoustic wave, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid.
In human physiology and psychology, sound is the ''reception'' of such waves and their ''perception'' by the ...
or to a
tree hide.
"
Barcarole
A barcarolle (; from French, also barcarole; originally, Italian barcarola or barcaruola, from ''barca'' 'boat') is a traditional folk song sung by Venetian gondoliers, or a piece of music composed in that style. In classical music, two of the ...
" in music shares the same etymology, being originally a folk song sung by
Venetian
Venetian often means from or related to:
* Venice, a city in Italy
* Veneto, a region of Italy
* Republic of Venice (697–1797), a historical nation in that area
Venetian and the like may also refer to:
* Venetian language, a Romance language s ...
gondolier
The gondola (, ; vec, góndoła ) is a traditional, flat-bottomed Venetian rowing boat, well suited to the conditions of the Venetian lagoon. It is typically propelled by a gondolier, who uses a rowing oar, which is not fastened to the hull ...
and derived from ''barca'' — "boat" in Italian, or in Late Latin.
Bark
![Endeavour entering Fremantle](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/95/Endeavour_entering_Fremantle.jpg)
In the 18th century, the
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...
used the term bark for a nondescript vessel that did not fit any of its usual categories. Thus, when the British admiralty purchased a
collier for use by
James Cook
James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean an ...
in his journey of exploration, she was registered as to distinguish her from another ''Endeavour'', a
sloop
A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...
already in service at the time. She happened to be a
full-rigged ship
A full-rigged ship or fully rigged ship is a sailing vessel's sail plan with three or more masts, all of them square-rigged. A full-rigged ship is said to have a ship rig or be ship-rigged. Such vessels also have each mast stepped in three se ...
with a plain bluff bow and a full stern with windows.
William Falconer's ''Dictionary of the Marine'' defined "bark", as "A general name given to small ships: it is however peculiarly appropriated by seamen to those which carry three masts without a
mizzen
The mast of a sailing vessel is a tall spar, or arrangement of spars, erected more or less vertically on the centre-line of a ship or boat. Its purposes include carrying sails, spars, and derricks, and giving necessary height to a navigation ligh ...
topsail
A topsail ("tops'l") is a sail set above another sail; on square-rigged vessels further sails may be set above topsails.
Square rig
On a square rigged vessel, a topsail is a typically trapezoidal shaped sail rigged above the course sail and ...
. Our Northern Mariners, who are trained in the coal-trade, apply this distinction to a broad-sterned ship, which carries no ornamental figure on the stem or prow."
The
UK's National Archives state that a paper document surviving from the 16th century in the Cheshire and Chester Archives and Local Studies Service, notes the names of
Robert Ratclyfe, owner of the bark "Sunday" and 10 mariners appointed to serve under Rt. Hon. the Earl of Sussex,
Lord Deputy of Ireland
The Lord Deputy was the representative of the monarch and head of the Irish executive (government), executive under English rule, during the Lordship of Ireland and then the Kingdom of Ireland. He deputised prior to 1523 for the Viceroy of Ireland ...
.
Barque rig
![Barkskibs staende rigning2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/Barkskibs_staende_rigning2.png)
By the end of the 18th century, the term barque (sometimes, particularly in the US, spelled bark) came to refer to any vessel with a particular type of
sail plan
A sail plan is a description of the specific ways that a sailing craft is rigged. Also, the term "sail plan" is a graphic depiction of the arrangement of the sails for a given sailing craft.>
In the English language, ships were usually describe ...
. This comprises three (or more)
masts,
fore-and-aft sails
A fore-and-aft rig is a sailing vessel rigged mainly with sails set along the line of the keel, rather than perpendicular to it as on a square rigged vessel.
Description
Fore-and-aft rigged sails include staysails, Bermuda rigged sails, gaff ...
on the
aft
"Aft", in nautical terminology, is an adjective or adverb meaning towards the stern (rear) of the ship, aircraft or spacecraft, when the frame of reference is within the ship, headed at the fore. For example, "Able Seaman Smith; lie aft!" or "Wh ...
ermost mast and
square sails on all other masts. Barques were the workhorse of the
golden age of sail
The Age of Sail is a period that lasted at the latest from the mid-16th (or mid- 15th) to the mid- 19th centuries, in which the dominance of sailing ships in global trade and warfare culminated, particularly marked by the introduction of naval ...
in the mid-19th century as they attained passages that nearly matched full-rigged ships, but could operate with smaller crews.
The advantage of these rigs was that they needed smaller (therefore cheaper) crews than a comparable
full-rigged ship
A full-rigged ship or fully rigged ship is a sailing vessel's sail plan with three or more masts, all of them square-rigged. A full-rigged ship is said to have a ship rig or be ship-rigged. Such vessels also have each mast stepped in three se ...
or
brig
A brig is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: two masts which are both square rig, square-rigged. Brigs originated in the second half of the 18th century and were a common type of smaller merchant vessel or warship from then until the ...
-rigged vessel, as fewer of the labour-intensive square sails were used, and the rig itself is cheaper. Conversely, the ship rig tended to be retained for training vessels where the larger the crew, the more seamen were trained.
Another advantage is that, downwind, a barque can outperform a
schooner
A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...
or
barkentine
A barquentine or schooner barque (alternatively "barkentine" or "schooner bark") is a sailing vessel with three or more masts; with a square rigged foremast and fore-and-aft rigged main, mizzen and any other masts.
Modern barquentine sailing r ...
, and is both easier to handle and better at going to windward than a full-rigged ship. While a full-rigged ship is the best runner available, and while fore-and-aft rigged vessels are the best at going to windward, the barque and the barquentine, are compromises, which combine, in different proportions, the best elements of these two.
Whether square-rig, barque, barquentine or schooner is optimal depends on the degree to which the sailing-route and season can be chosen to achieve following-wind. Square-riggers predominated for intercontinental sailing on routes chosen for following-winds.
Most ocean-going
windjammer
A windjammer is a commercial sailing ship with multiple masts that may be square rigged, or fore-and-aft rigged, or a combination of the two. The informal term "windjammer" arose during the transition from the Age of Sail to the Age of Steam ...
s were four-masted barques, due to the above-described considerations & compromises. Usually the main mast was the tallest; that of ''
Moshulu
''Moshulu'' is a four-masted steel barque, built as ''Kurt'' by William Hamilton and Company at Port Glasgow in Scotland in 1904. The largest remaining original windjammer, she is currently a floating restaurant docked in Penn's Landing, Phila ...
'' extends to 58 m off the deck. The four-masted barque can be handled with a surprisingly small crew—at minimum, 10—and while the usual crew was around 30, almost half of them could be apprentices.
![Potosi - SLV H99](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/Potosi_-_SLV_H99.220-2488.jpg)
Today many sailing-
school ship
A training ship is a ship used to train students as sailors. The term is mostly used to describe ships employed by navies to train future officers. Essentially there are two types: those used for training at sea and old hulks used to house classr ...
s are barques.
A well-preserved example of a commercial barque is the ''
Pommern
Pomerania ( pl, Pomorze; german: Pommern; Kashubian: ''Pòmòrskô''; sv, Pommern) is a historical region on the southern shore of the Baltic Sea in Central Europe, split between Poland and Germany. The western part of Pomerania belongs to ...
'', the only windjammer in original condition. Its home is in
Mariehamn
Mariehamn ( , ; fi, Maarianhamina ; la, Portus Mariae) is the capital city, capital of Åland, an autonomous territory under Finland, Finnish sovereignty. Mariehamn is the seat of the Government of Åland, Government and Parliament of Åland, ...
outside the
Åland
Åland ( fi, Ahvenanmaa: ; ; ) is an Federacy, autonomous and Demilitarized zone, demilitarised region of Finland since 1920 by a decision of the League of Nations. It is the smallest region of Finland by area and population, with a size of 1 ...
maritime museum. The wooden barque ''
Sigyn
Sigyn (Old Norse: "(woman) friend of victory"Orchard (1997:146).) is a deity from Norse mythology. She is attested in the ''Poetic Edda'', compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and the ''Prose Edda'', written in the 13t ...
'', built in
Gothenburg
Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...
1887, is now a
museum ship
A museum ship, also called a memorial ship, is a ship that has been preserved and converted into a museum open to the public for educational or memorial purposes. Some are also used for training and recruitment purposes, mostly for the small numb ...
in
Turku
Turku ( ; ; sv, Åbo, ) is a city and former capital on the southwest coast of Finland at the mouth of the Aura River, in the region of Finland Proper (''Varsinais-Suomi'') and the former Turku and Pori Province (''Turun ja Porin lääni''; ...
. The wooden
whaling
Whaling is the process of hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that became increasingly important in the Industrial Revolution.
It was practiced as an organized industry ...
barque ''
Charles W. Morgan'', launched 1841, taken out of service 1921, is now a museum ship at
Mystic Seaport
Mystic Seaport Museum or Mystic Seaport: The Museum of America and the Sea in Mystic, Connecticut is the largest maritime museum in the United States. It is notable for its collection of sailing ships and boats and for the re-creation of the craf ...
in
Connecticut
Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...
. The ''Charles W. Morgan'' has recently been refit and is (as of summer, 2014) sailing the New England coast. The
United States Coast Guard
The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, military, mult ...
still has an operational barque, built in Germany in 1936 and captured as a
war prize
A prize of war is a piece of enemy property or land seized by a belligerent party during or after a war or battle, typically at sea. This term was used nearly exclusively in terms of captured ships during the 18th and 19th centuries. Basis in inte ...
, the
USCGC ''Eagle'', which the
United States Coast Guard Academy
The United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA) is a service academy of the United States Coast Guard in New London, Connecticut. Founded in 1876, it is the smallest of the five U.S. service academies and provides education to future Coast Gu ...
in
New London
New London may refer to:
Places United States
*New London, Alabama
*New London, Connecticut
*New London, Indiana
*New London, Iowa
* New London, Maryland
*New London, Minnesota
*New London, Missouri
*New London, New Hampshire, a New England town
* ...
uses as a training vessel. The
Sydney Heritage Fleet
Sydney Heritage Fleet, is the trading name of Sydney Maritime Museum Ltd., a public (non-profit) company in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
The Fleet restores and operates a number of historic vessels including the barque ''James Craig' ...
restored an iron-hulled three-masted barque, the
''James Craig'', originally constructed as ''Clan Macleod'' in 1874 and sailing at sea fortnightly. The oldest active sailing vessel in the world, the
''Star of India'', was built in 1863 as a full-rigged ship, then converted into a barque in 1901.
This type of ship inspired the French composer Maurice Ravel to write his famous piece, ''Une Barque sur l'ocean'', originally composed for piano, in 1905, then orchestrated in 1906.
Statsraad Lemkulhl is in active operation in its barque form, stripped down without most of its winches and later improvements more aligned to the upbringing of future sailors both as a schoolship, training operations for the Norwegian Navy and generally available for interested volunteers.
During the summer of 2021, it hosted "NRK Sommarskuta" with live TV everyday sailing all of the Norwegian coast from North to South and crossing the North Sea to Shetland. After this it will perform its first full sailing trip around world, estimated to take 19 months with many promotional events along the way.
Scientific equipment has been installed in support of ongoing university studies to monitor and log environmental data.
Barques and barque shrines in Ancient Egypt
In
Ancient Egypt, barques, referred to using the French word as
Egyptian hieroglyphs
Egyptian hieroglyphs (, ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt, used for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with some 1,000 distinct characters.There were about 1,00 ...
were first translated by the Frenchman
Jean-François Champollion
Jean-François Champollion (), also known as Champollion ''le jeune'' ('the Younger'; 23 December 17904 March 1832), was a French philologist and orientalist, known primarily as the decipherer of Egyptian hieroglyphs and a founding figure in th ...
, were a type of boat used from Egypt's earliest recorded times and are depicted in many drawings, paintings, and reliefs that document the culture. Transportation to the afterlife was believed to be accomplished by way of barques, as well, and the image is used in many of the religious murals and carvings in temples and tombs.
The most important Egyptian barque carried the dead
pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: ''pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the an ...
to become a deity. Great care was taken to provide a beautiful barque to the pharaoh for this journey, and models of the boats were placed in their tombs. Many models of these boats, that range from tiny to huge in size, have been found. Wealthy and royal members of the culture also provided barques for their final journey. The type of vessel depicted in Egyptian images remains quite similar throughout the thousands of years the culture persisted.
Barques were important religious
artifacts, and since the deities were thought to travel in this fashion in the sky, the
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye ...
was seen as a great waterway that was as important as the
Nile
The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin language, Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered ...
on Earth;
cult statues of the deities traveled by boats on water and ritual boats were carried about by the priests during festival ceremonies.
Temples
A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...
included barque shrines, sometimes more than one in a temple, in which the sacred barques rested when a procession was not in progress. In these stations, the boats would be watched over and cared for by the priests.
Barque of St. Peter
The
Barque of St. Peter
The term Barque of St. Peter or Ship/Boat of St. Peter or Barque of the Church, symbolises the Roman Catholic Church as a barque. The symbolism refers to St. Peter, the first Pope, a fisherman who became one of the 12 Apostles of Jesus. The Roman ...
, or the Barque of Peter, is a reference to the
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
. The term refers to
Peter
Peter may refer to:
People
* List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name
* Peter (given name)
** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church
* Peter (surname), a sur ...
, the first
Pope
The pope ( la, papa, from el, πάππας, translit=pappas, 'father'), also known as supreme pontiff ( or ), Roman pontiff () or sovereign pontiff, is the bishop of Rome (or historically the patriarch of Rome), head of the worldwide Cathol ...
, who was a fisherman before becoming an apostle of Jesus. The Pope is often said to be steering the Barque of St. Peter.
See also
*
Barquentine
A barquentine or schooner barque (alternatively "barkentine" or "schooner bark") is a sailing vessel with three or more masts; with a square rigged foremast and fore-and-aft rigged main, mizzen and any other masts.
Modern barquentine sailing r ...
(three masts, fore mast square-rigged)
*
Brigantine
A brigantine is a two-masted sailing vessel with a fully square-rigged foremast and at least two sails on the main mast: a square topsail and a gaff sail mainsail (behind the mast). The main mast is the second and taller of the two masts.
Older ...
(two masts, fore mast square-rigged)
*
Jackass-barque
A jackass-barque, sometimes spelled jackass bark, is a sailing ship with three (or more) masts, of which the foremast is square-rigged and the main is partially square-rigged (topsail, topgallant, etc.) and partially fore-and-aft rigged (course). ...
(three masts, fore mast and upper part of mizzen mast square-rigged)
*
Schooner
A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schoon ...
*
Windjammer
A windjammer is a commercial sailing ship with multiple masts that may be square rigged, or fore-and-aft rigged, or a combination of the two. The informal term "windjammer" arose during the transition from the Age of Sail to the Age of Steam ...
*
List of large sailing vessels
This is a list of large sailing vessels, past and present, including sailing mega yachts, tall ships, sailing cruise ships, and large sailing military ships. It is sorted by overall length.
The list, which is in the form of a table, covers vessel ...
References
Further reading
*
External links
Description of the four-masted barque ''Kaiwo Maru''
{{Authority control
Sailing rigs and rigging