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wonderful experience on in lamu island, coastal province of Kenya -


== Further reading == == Further reading ==

Revision as of 13:58, 10 November 2009

A dhow near Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
Crew members of HMNZS Te Mana board a dhow in the north Arabian Sea
A present-day dhow in the Indian Ocean
Construction and repair of dhows, near Mtoni, Zanzibar
Dhow ferrying passengers near Inhambane, Mozambique.
1937 stamp of Aden depicting a dhow.
A dhow with three masts

A dhow (Arabic,داو) is a traditional Arab sailing vessel with one or more lateen sails. They are primarily used along the coasts of the Arabian Peninsula, Pakistan, India, and East Africa. Larger dhows have crews of approximately thirty, while smaller dhows typically have crews of around twelve.

History

Even to the present day Dhows make commercial journeys between the Persian Gulf and East Africa using sails as their only means of propulsion. Their cargo is mostly dates and fish to East Africa and mangrove timber to the lands in the Persian Gulf. Often they sail south with the monsoon in winter or early spring and back again to Arabia in late spring or early summer.

The term "dhow" is also applied to small, traditionally-constructed vessels used for trade in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf area and the Indian Ocean from Madagascar to the Gulf of Bengal. Such vessels typically weigh 300 to 500 tons, and have a long, thin hull design.

Also, it is a family of early Arab ships that used the lateen sail on which the Portuguese likely based their designs for the caravel known to Arabs as sambuk, booms, baggalas, ghanjas, and zaruqs.

Navigation

For celestial navigation, dhow sailors have traditionally used the kamal. This observation device determines latitude by finding the angle of the Pole Star above the horizon.

Trade

Types of dhow

  • Ghanjah - a large vessel with a curved stem and a sloping, ornately carved transom.
  • Baghlah - the traditional deep-sea dhow
  • Battil - featured long stems topped by large, club-shaped stem heads
  • Badan - a smaller vessel requiring a shallow draught

See also

References

Further reading

External links

Types of sailing vessels and rigs
Overviews
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Naval and merchant
sailing ships
and other vessels
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15th c.
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