Best Seafaring culture of all times?

[axi]

Phoenicians/Carthaginians: One of the first sea trading nations in the planet, first to create trading colonies, one of the two major forces dominating the Mediterranean BC, said to be the first to circumvent Africa.

Minoans/Byzantines/Greeks: The first to buid and maintain warships and war fleets, with extensive trading colony network, the other major force in the Med BC. Inventors of the trireme, the dromund and the Greek fire. Long list of naval sucesses against the Persians, the Saracens, the Turks, the Italians. First to use arson ships in the 1821 revolution, first to commit aeronautical operation in the Balkan wars. Great sailors. Currently owners of one of the biggest merchant fleets in the world.

Vikings/Norse/Norwegians: The first to sail in the open ocean. Discovered Greenland and North America. Inventors of the drakkar, the best warship of it's time. Great legacy of seaborne raids. Best fishing fleet for the last couple of centuries. Great sailors. Currently owners of one of the biggest merchant fleets in the world.

British: The first to explore and colonise North America and Oceania and to discover the south pole. First to use the propeller. Inventors of the dreadnought. The first to employ buccaneers against their rivals. The best navy from the age of sail through to WW2, with major naval victories.

Spanish: The second to discover America, the first to colonise it. The first to circumvent the globe. Greatest power of the age of sail.

Portuguese: Found a way to India around Africa. First europeans to travel to Indonesia, China and Japan. Set up a huge network of trading posts. Great sailors.

Romans/Italians/Venetians/Genoese: Built the biggest ships of the ancient world. Major naval force of the mediterranean from time to time. The first to mount guns on warships (galleys).

Arabs/Saracens: Inventors of the triangle sail. Heavy trade and various discoveries in the Indian ocean. Great pirate culture, dominated the Med for a couple of centuries.

Chinese: Discovered half the world before the Europeans did. Had the biggest navy in the world until the 15th century, when they quit sailing for a mysterious reason.

Americans: First to use the steamship. First to use ironclads. Perfected the aircraft carrier as the base for modern naval warfare. Biggest modern navy.

Polynesians/Melanesians/Micronesians: Colonised all the Pacific with tiny boats. Used to travelling huge distances in the open sea.

To me the greatest seafaring cultures are judged by the special weight that seafaring has in the culture, regardless of navy size and number of achievements.

[KrazyHorse]

Brits. 3.5 centuries of total naval dominance.

[VetLegion]

you are cunning axi, you are aware that 'floating bannana' would win if it was option in the poll?


Anyway, Brits, as results speak for them. Second would be Vikings, they were fierce.

[orange]

though debatably not the best, don't you think the Japanese deserve a spot on the poll?

[Hueij]

I'm not going to vote. First of all, no banana option, and second, more important, we Dutch don't like to be thrown on the "other" heap...

Edit: I'm even more pissed about this because it's the 400th birthday of the VOC this year...

[Jay Bee]

Hey KH, ever heard of the Jenkins' Ear War?

[Ramo]

If you mean, the culture that best fostered seafearing, I would say that the Arabs take the cake, considering their nomadic past and their missionary religion.

[KrazyHorse]

Hey KH, ever heard of the Jenkins' Ear War?

Yes. I'm surprised it's known as that in Spain.

[Berzerker]

Have to go with the Polynesians based on the distances and seafaring knowledge. Won't lose "triremes" with them.

[Faeelin]

You've gotta love a nation where one of the most famous songs goes

"Rue, Britannia.
Britannia Rules the Waves.
Britons never ever shall be slaves!"


Editted: I thought it and God save the king were the two of them?

[KrazyHorse]

That's not their national anthem.

[Jack the Bodiless]

The Polynesians. What they did was incredible.

How did they find so many tiny islands across thousands of miles of ocean? If it was by sheer trial-and-error, they must have lost many colonists who failed to find anything.

Though I think the Australian aborigines deserve a mention. They could only have reached Australia by boat, tens of thousands of years before any trace of boat-usage anywhere else in the world.

[Bereta_Eder]

hmmm I'll have to go with the portueguese on this one. They pretty much rocked the world of seafaring as it is known. Noone compares to them...


We were conmfined in the mediteranean anyway. The furtest we went was britain and it was full of lycanthrope savages at the time (maybe ancestors of Thatcher).

We had a virgin with us that we traded with the brit lycanthropes for supplies, how great does that makes us?

at least that's the myth

[Ecowiz Returns]

I had to vote: the Portuguese

Sorry, couldn't help it!

KH, 3,5 centuries seems an awfull lot for British dominance.
Are you saying that the British already had sea dominance in the XVIth century (I assume we are not counting the XXth century, so 3,5 centuries would bring us to the XVIth).

AFIK, not even in the XVIIth century did the Brits had sea dominance. In those days, the Dutch had also important seafaring power. For instance, since the Dutch took over the Cape Route fromm the Portuguese, in the XVIIth century, up until now, they have dominated that route.

I also have a particular respect for those that first sailed unchartered waters (such as the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Polinesian, the Vikings and the Chinese). Among these, the Polinesian have too few contact with other civilizations; the Chinense are mostly a continental empire; about the Spanish (I know Jay Bee will disagree with me but...) I can't avoid mentioning that two of the seafaring sucesses - one of which, Columbus' Discouvery of "the Western Route to India", is debatable - could have easily be done by the Portuguese and also Spain became, basicly, a continental power of her own (both in Europe and in the American Continent); the Vikings were an amazing seafaring Civilization but the Portuguese exceled in long distance trade, while most of the Vikings' sucesses were much closer to "home base".

So, it had to be the Portuguese!

[SnowFire]

when they quit sailing for a mysterious reason.

Not really that mysterious. Their emperor went nuts/ extremely short sighted and banned the practice. Quite simple when you think about it.