# ship sails



## valiant12 (Oct 18, 2015)

How were ships sail manufactured? What was historically the most used material for sails? which is the best natural material for ship sails?
Is it true that the vikings used wool cloth for sails? I remember reading it somewhere, but it seems contra productive. Did they have some secret for making very light waterproof wool.


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## Butterfly (Oct 18, 2015)

> Did they have some secret for making very light waterproof wool.



Well, wool is naturally waterproof, so unlikely. But this may be of interest... The Wool

Anyway, looks like sailcloth could be linen, cotton, canvas.


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## valiant12 (Oct 18, 2015)

> Well, wool is naturally waterproof, so unlikely



Thanks for the info.


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## Butterfly (Oct 19, 2015)

Water repellent, I should have said, not waterproof. It's down to the fibres having a waxy coating.


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## CupofJoe (Oct 19, 2015)

Sails can be made from almost anything you can make a cloth out of. 
The traditional north European sails material would be Flax / Linen and Hemp. Hemp was used for Ropes too.
Cotton came later. I haven't heard about Wool sails before.


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## koen-hagens (Mar 17, 2016)

Wool sails wouldn't make sense, because even though it is water repellent to some extent,it will get very heavy when wet, i can know because I grow up around sheep . 

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## skip.knox (Mar 17, 2016)

I realized in reading this thread that I didn't know what canvas was. I was a bit surprised.
What is Duck Cloth | Commonly Called Canvas Fabric 
Note that since it's made from cotton, you'll need to make sure your society has access to cotton. I was interested to find that canvas was also used in the construction of some shields Canvas - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia 

Linen, otoh, is made from flax. Here, in case you're interested. Linen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


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## koen-hagens (Mar 17, 2016)

Quick note. As a dutchman I just have to say duck cloth is a terrible translation. 

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## Jerseydevil (Mar 17, 2016)

Naval history isn't really my thing, but from what I know it was made from cotton or linen, and was in a very thick canvas cloth. What is important to know is that the sail is very, very thick. Sailors repairing the sails would sew it using a giant needle and would force it through with a leather pad on their palms, pushing with their entire arm into it to get it through. A knife or sword thrust would bounce off of it rather than pierce or cut it. I have heard of oilcloth, which was lightly oiled cloth (someone spent a great deal of time thinking up a name) which was used for water resistant clothing. I have no idea if it was used for sails, though.


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## skip.knox (Mar 17, 2016)

koen-hagens said:


> Quick note. As a dutchman I just have to say duck cloth is a terrible translation.



Yes it is. It's more of a phonetic thing, not really a translation. It's just how the word moved between languages.


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## skip.knox (Mar 17, 2016)

> A knife or sword thrust would bounce off of it 

Yeah, that Disney moment of sliding down a sail by jamming a sabre into it is just plain ridiculous. Fun, though. And an excellent example of how a touch can work in a movie but would never work in a novel.


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## Caged Maiden (Mar 18, 2016)

Linen is a misunderstanding that people continue to propagate. In history (in the accounts of what things were made of in earlier times), historical people used the word "linen" a lot, and for good reason--it was a word used to describe loads of fabrics made from the fibers of many plants. Not flax specifically, until later. In fact historically, the most used fiber for "linen" was Chinese nettles. Flax is a labor-intensive plant and its fibers are no more than 12" long, and so its harvest and processing was much more difficult than other plants that were used widely as clothing fibers. Unfortunately, in our modern world, we don't make clothing from historical materials anymore, and so you cannot find them available anywhere commercially. Historical flax linen was much different than what we make tablecloths and drapes from now, too. It was very fine in many cases, very expensive and desirable. In early history, it was used a lot by the northern people because flax grows in a cold climate, unlike other plants that can be used for cloth. It was a matter of availability, really, not preference. Flax linen is mostly dry-cleaned or hand-washed today because it doesn't hold up to many washings and dryings, losing fiber in the lint trap like crazy. It was easy to bleach because it held up to the sun and chemicals used in bleaching and dying. That's one of the reasons it became a favorite for clothing (underwear being bright white for the rich, and natural white for other folks).

Sailcloth was rough and durable. Remember, there were many uses for "canvas". Ships used it for sails, armies used it for tents, and tailors used it to interface dresses, giving ladies a bit of structure to hide their bulges. I have a piece of linen fabric that has all the tenacity of cotton canvas, and I also have a silk that's just as tough! When selecting a material, both a fiber and a cloth, there are many factors, not simply what's available. Wool has a few features that would make it a horrible sailcloth. One, it isn't cheap. It takes a lot of processing. You have to feed it grain and breed it and house it while it's growing, protect it from predators and feed and house those protectors. It must be sheared and carded and cleaned and combed. It then must be woven on a loom (or knitted into a garment), which any fabric does. When wet, it is really heavy, and it shrinks with heat. It is a process called "fulling" whereby you wet wool fabric and shrink it in heat (or just hot water), and then it becomes very tight and thick. It makes an excellent coat then, being warm and tight and water repellent, but it is heavier because of its structure.

Sailcloth was exposed to the elements nonstop, so it needs to be lightweight and tightly woven. It needs to dry quickly and stand up to the sun's burning rays. Hemp is a good fiber and was used widely, but I'm not sure how finely woven it can be, because it isn't a fiber I use regularly, but I've seen it historically used for clothing, so it must have some practical use as clothing, I suppose.

Cotton was available from Northern Africa for a long time. When we're talking about history, understand that there is a huge difference in describing Viking flax linen, fourteenth century nettle linen worn by common people, Elizabethan linsey-woolsey (blend of wool and flax linen) or cotton linen blends used in a gown, and American cotton from 1810. These are all very different fabrics and because we use a lot of synthetics now, most historical fabrics have disappeared.

You asked how it would be sewn, and until big looms were created (not sure exactly when, but not before the 1500s), looms were narrow. Too wide, and the fabric created suffered distortion. Scottish woolen fabrics (which turned into the "tartans" we know today), were sewn together in the middle, one long seam down the center. A traditional kilt was 42" wide, I think, two rows of fabric stuck together, and about 3-4 meters long, making them a big blanket that was then tucked into a belt and pleated loosely. That's how people got those wide bolts, they attached several small strips into bigger ones. A sail would have been the same. If a sail (making up measurements now, because I'm not into sail technology) was 40 feet long and 40 feet wide, it would have been perhaps cut into 20 foot lengths of woven fabric, alternately sewn (in 21" wide stripes) in I'd assume a brick pattern, to avoid putting too much stress on any given four-corner seams. Tents are made the same way, though now we have wider bolts of canvas that are 54" and more wide. I hope this is clear, I know it's a lot of info, but I know fabric really well, having been a historical costumer for the last 20 years. 

If you don't have cotton in your world, use other plant fibers. Pick something that's easily grown and easy to harvest and process, and something that can be cheaply made and is durable enough to use on a ship's sails. That is, if you're writing about Dutch traders or whatever. If you're writing triremes with single sails or small sails, hell, use silk. I've heard silk sails were used (though I can't confirm it), and silk has a lot of properties that would make it an excellent sail fabric. Also, imperfect silk was as cheap as low-grade linen or cotton. Only fine silk, like fine linen was really expensive.


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## Caged Maiden (Mar 18, 2016)

Hey Skip, my fencing armor is lined with silk canvas. It certainly does lessen the odds of an accidental cut! HA! Since silk canvas is hard to find, I reserve what i have left for myself, but when I sew for other fencers, I typically use a layer of cotton canvas because it really is super durable, can be washed infinitely, and holds its structure for a long time. So much better than synthetics like "trigger" which contains about 45% polyester threads, because those don't breathe and wick away sweat. I feel sorry for every fencer who doesn't know the difference between natural fabrics and synthetics. On hot summer days in a field battle, they certainly feel the difference


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## FifthView (Mar 18, 2016)

valiant12 said:


> Is it true that the vikings used wool cloth for sails? I remember reading it somewhere, but it seems contra productive. Did they have some secret for making very light waterproof wool.



This is a shocker for me too, but a google search for "wool sail" has turned up multiple links which support the idea that they did, indeed, use wool sails.

Woollen sailcloth - Vikingeskibsmuseet Roskilde

Here is a paper titled _The Introducion of Sails to Scandinavia: Raw materials, Labour and Land_ that explores with more detail what was required for such heavy use of wool.

So I've learned something new today.


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