Dugout Canoe Research Articles

A Dugout Canoe from Ontario

AbstractIn recent years several dugout canoes have been found in Ontario, but details are lacking for most. One raised from shallow water at Balsam Lake is badly eroded and appears to be of some antiquity. It is a sleek craft of unusual length, remarkably slim proportions and contour, and considerable rigidity, despite its apparent lightness in proportion to its size, because of its substantial bow and stern.

The Context of some Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Remains from Lincolnshire

It has been possible recently to correlate some well known Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age finds from the Ancholme Valley, north Lincolnshire, with the stratigraphy of the valley and with the pollen statistical zone scheme. A digest of the material of archaeological interest is presented here together with an account of the investigation of the site of the dugout canoe at Short Ferry, Fiskerton, near Lincoln.

Sex Gender in Central American Carib

Previous articleNext article No AccessSex Gender in Central American CaribDouglas TaylorDouglas Taylor Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by International Journal of American Linguistics Volume 17, Number 2Apr., 1951 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/464113 Views: 2Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Jena Barchas-Lichtenstein Garifuna Quantification, (Jan 2012): 165–225.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-2681-9_4

A New Dug-out Canoe

A New Dug-out Canoe

Report on a recently discovered Dug-out Canoe from Peterborough

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Making an Outlet from Lake Bangweulu in Northern Rhodesia

Towards the end of 1942 I started to make an outlet from lake Bangweulu so at loaded power boats could pass from the lake into the Luapula river. The main purpose was to enable Government to transport cassava to the Copperbelt of Northern Rhodesia, where war-time conditions and great increase of staff had made this an important emergency food for the African workers. The shores of lake Bangweulu are thickly populated and the ten thousand bags of cassava needed annually could easily be produced. There are two roads touching the lake, one at Nsombo on the north-east and one at Mwamfuli on the west. The former had been used for lorry transport of food to the Great North Military Road and the latter for direct transport to the Copperbelt. The water transport to buying depots and the road heads had been by dug-out canoe. By 1942 lorries were so scarce that the scheme of making a water outlet from the lake was pressed. If such an outlet could be made to carry powerful boats it would be possible to take the meal by water from the lake depots into the Luapula and down to Kapalala, which is only 60 miles by road from the Copperbelt. Mwamfuli, on the lake shore, is about 160 miles, so the saving in lorry and tyre wear would be considerable. As District Commissioner, Luwingu, I was put in charge of the scheme. In 1942 Government voted one thousand pounds as a token sum to start making the outlet. In 1943 I also began work on a power-boat route through the swamps to link up with the new outlet. Five thousand pounds was voted for the general schemes of which approximately half was for the outlet work and for the purchase of boats. In 1944 a further five thousand pounds was voted of which nearly half, again, went on the outlet scheme and boats. In later years maintenance money rather than capital expenditure will be needed, although several thousands of pounds are being voted for 1945. The scheme is thus expensive. This paper however is concerned with the practical and geographical aspects, so I quote these figures only to show the value set on the scheme.

A Dug-out Canoe from Shropshire: A Bogus Antiquity

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A Dug-out Canoe from Shropshire

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Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

THE origin of the dug-out canoe, over which there was so much controversy, has now been finally settled. I have ascertained definitely that the canoes are in use in the East Indies, mostly at Celebes and the Malacca. At the latter place there are men who actually make them for sale.

Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

WITH regard to the recent correspondence in NATURE on the derelict canoe washed ashore in Algoa Bay, I have now received information from Lieut.-Col. M. L. Ferrar, Chief Commissioner, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, that it was reported in October 1925 that the sailing ship Sree Shanasckthi picked up three Nicobarese who were found clinging to a submerged canoe, which would have been of the ordinary size, holding six to eight people. These men belonged to Lapati, Car Nicobars. In the Albany Museum, Grahamstown, there are pieces of pumice from the Krakatoa eruption, that were washed ashore in South Africa; they have been preserved with all the barnacles and seaweed adhering, just as they arrived. I saw the Port Elizabeth canoe shortly after it had been pulled out of the water, and the encrusting material was identical in kind, showing both had been submerged for the same time, under similar conditions. Some part must have been above the sea for them to have caught the monsoon wind that drove them across. If the boat is from Car Nicobars, then it took sixteen months to come to South Africa, and somehow I think that four months is more likely correct. I am still inclined to place the origin in the Mergui Archipelago, because of the spoon-shaped fore-foot, and general shape.

Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

MR. F. W. FITZSIMONS has sent me a fragment of wood from the dug-out canoe washed ashore in Algoa Bay, described by him in NATURE of May 21, and since referred to by other correspondents in these columns. I am naturally far from desirous of entering into the discussion on the exact origin of the canoe, but the results of my examination of the wood show, I think conclusively, that the canoe had its origin somewhere in the Bay of Bengal off the coast of Burma or the Malay Peninsula, and that the Nicobar Islands cannot have furnished the particular timber from which it was made.

Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

MR. FITZSIMONS, in his letter published in NATURE of May 21 (vol. 119, p. 746), gives an account of a derelict canoe that was washed ashore in Algoa Bay, South Africa, in February of this year. A study of the photograph which accompanies his letter indicates that he is mistaken in attributing the canoe to the ‘Mawken’ or, as they are usually known in this country, the Salons of the Mergui Archipelago. The Salon canoe has a ‘step’ in both bow- and stern-end, and there is no trace of anything of this kind in the canoe at Algoa Bay. On the other hand, the high-curved prow, broken off short at the base, and the flat but narrow stern-end clearly indicate that the canoe originally came from the Nicobar Islands. The side blocks shown in Mr. FitzSimons's photograph are for the attachment of the thwarts, made of split bamboo, and for the support for the outrigger. In some cases the canoes are fitted with one or more short masts, which are stepped on the thwarts, but in others they have a single mast fitted with a large square sail. The canoes are steered by a paddle.

Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

I WOULD suggest that, in order to find the home of the canoe which Mr. F. W. FitzSimons discovered on the beach. of Algoa Bay (NATURE, May 21, p. 746), it is scarcely necessary to look across 5000 miles of ocean. Canoes of this type, with two upturned ends, are commonly carried as tenders by the many Arab dhows which trade along the northern part of the east coast of Africa and from Port Sudan to Zanzibar —and also along the west coast of Madagascar; very similar canoes, either with or without outriggers, are ordinarily employed by the local fishermen.

Dug-out Canoe in Algoa Bay

THE canoe found on the shore of Algoa Bay and illustrated in Mr. FitzSimon's letter in NATURE of May 21, p. 746, differs in several respects from those of the Mawken or Selungs of the Mergui Archipelago. During many months spent among those people, I do not remember ever to have seen a Mawken canoe, a kabang, in which the solid hull, apart from the palm stem bulwarks, did not have a gradual sheer from amidships upwards to bow and stern. But more important still, the Selung kabang has a semi-circular notch cut out of the prow and stern of the hull. These form steps by which it is safe and easy to climb into the canoe from the water. I feel sure that whatever may be the origin of the canoe found in South Africa, it did not come from the Mergui Archipelago.

A Mawken Canoe in Algoa Bay

ACCOMPANYING this is a photograph (Fig. 1) of a dug-out canoe which I found washed up on the sea beach in Algoa Bay at a point known as New Brighton. The canoe is 22 feet long, 16 inches in width, and 14 inches deep. It has been hollowed out from a large tree. Towards the stem there is a cavity in the bottom of the canoe for the reception of a mast. The side pieces, which have the appearance of rowlocks, can be clearly seen in the photograph.

The Danube Thoroughfare and the Beginnings of Civilization in Europe

While high civilizations were growing up in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Aegean, continental Europe was still recovering from an ice age. Though the glaciers had retreated, the high passes that led across the Alps from the favoured Mediterranean to the interior were still virtually closed by snow. The tundras and steppes where the men of the Old Stone Age had hunted the reindeer were now for the most part covered with a dense forest fostered by the damp climate then ruling. Through the belt of forest and mountain that fenced off northern and western Europe early man could not easily penetrate. To reach Britain or Denmark he must take ship and face the perils of the Atlantic in a dug-out canoe or some only slightly superior craft. But one moving road leads right into the heart of the continent. From the Black Sea to Bavaria the Danube opens out a passage way far safer than the stormy Atlantic. Moreover it leads into territories where the uncongenial primeval forest did not grow so densely nor so inhospitably as on the coasts or highlands.Large tracts in Central Europe are covered with a deep deposit of fine wind-born dust that had formed during the dry ice ages. This aeolian soil termed “löss” is unfavourable to the growth of heavy timber, incidentally it provides ideal agricultural land.

A ‘Dug-out’ Canoe from South Wales: with Notes on the Chronology, Typology, and Distribution of Monoxylous Craft in England and Wales

In September 1925, Mr. Thomas Jenkins, a carpenter of Llangorse, Breconshire, recovered a dug-out canoe of oak from Llangorse Lake. This lake is situated six miles to the east-ward of the county town. It is about 500 ft. above sea-level, in the valley and near the source of the stream known as Afon Llynfi, which flows northward (into the Wye) along the western escarpment of the Black Mountains. The lake is a mile in length and in greatest breadth, and is of glacial origin.

Dug-out Canoe in Kent

Dug-out Canoe in Kent

Investigation of the Artificial Island in Loch Kinellan, Strathpeffer

Excavations were carried out over a number of seasons and included the recovery of a dug-out canoe which was serving as an underlying support of a portion of the woodwork in one of the pits. The crannog was a hunting seat of the Earls of Ross during the medieval period. When in 1476 ,the Earldom" of Ross was irrevocably annexed to the Crown, the " management of its rent" was entrusted by the King to the Earl of Sutherland, who transferred the trust to Alexander Mackenzie of Kintail, sixth chief of the Mackenzies. By the nineteenth century it was being used as a kitchen garden. It does not appear to have been a matter of common knowledge that the island was artificial. Structurally the island appears to consist of three main series of layers:, the upper structure of earth, clay, and boulders, with local seams\r\nof peat, charcoal, and burnt clay, the strata represented in the west half of the island by the platforms of timber with the intervening occupation debris, and in\r\nthe east half by the stratified layers of brushwood, clay, peat, and habitation refuse, the mass of organic material at the base of the island. Little direct evidence of the age of the crannog was obtained in course of the investigation. That wood-chips, cut with a sharp iron instrument, exist at the base of the island, is helpful only in a general way. The bones included portions of the skull of a shorthorn ox, which may be the Celtic shorthorn, Bos longifrons.

Discovery of a Dug-Out Canoe in the Thames at Hampton Court.

Discovery of a Dug-Out Canoe in the Thames at Hampton Court.