Coolest project in experimental archaeology

[BeBMan]

What's your favorite? What sort of knowlegde came out of it?

I always liked the idea of "The Trireme Trust" where they built a fully functional reconstruction of an ancient Athenian - guess what - trireme

The ship named Olympias was built during the 1980ies.

Wiki says:

She was subject to sea trials in 1987, 1990, 1992 and 1994, but one of the most informative was an exercise in 1988 when crewed by 170 volunteer oarsmen and oarswomen. Olympias achieved a speed of 9 knots (17 km/h) and was able to execute 180 degree turns within one minute, in an arc no wider than two and a half (2.5) ship-lengths. These results, achieved with an inexperienced crew, suggest that the ancient writers were not exaggerating about the capabilities of such vessels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympias_%28trireme%29

Triremes

Polyremes in general

[Hueij]

I kind of liked the Thor Heyerdahl expeditions.

[lord of the mark]

in 1491 Charles Mann cites attempts to perform slash and burn agriculture using stone tools, which are cited as evidence that stone tools are too inefficient for S&B, and that real S&B didnt get underway till Europeans brought steel tools. Ergo the preColumbians must have used other methods, and in Amazonia managed the forests instead. Im not sure I 100% buy it (I wonder if folks hadnt evolved much better ways to use stone tools, ways that are lost) but its an interesting experiment.

[Hueij]

Triremes
Polyremes in general

Yeah, except for the oarsmen