The Art of Rigging

By George Biddlecombe

Book Overview

"Few, today, can realize how important was the art of rigging a ship and reeving her gear in the days just old when all aloft was wood and hemp; or how great the part it has played in the building of Empire." -- Introduction.
Although mastery of the art of rigging is no longer required on board today's ships, legions of serious model ship builders who wish to rig their ships correctly need to learn the art in miniature. This book is widely considered the best manual ever produced on rigging the sailing ship. It is based on the extensively revised and updated 1848 edition prepared by Captain George Biddlecombe, a Master in the Royal Navy and former merchant seaman. The book is divided into five parts:
The First Part contains an alphabetical explanation of terms and phrases used in rigging. The Second Part consists of directions for the performance of operations incidental to rigging and preparing it on shore, with a table of the comparative strength of chain and rope. The Third Part contains the progressive method of rigging ships. The Fourth Part contains a description of reeving the running rigging and bending the sails in addition to the rigging of brigs, yachts, and small vessels. The Fifth Part comprises tables of the quantities and dimensions of the standing and running rigging of ships, brigs, fore-and-aft schooners, and cutters, with the species, size, and number of blocks, hearts, dead-eyes, etc.
Serious modelists, naval historians, armchair skippers -- any sailing buff -- will want to own a copy of The Art of Rigging. Complete and wonderfully clear, it is now available in its first inexpensive paperback edition. It belongs in every maritime library.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0486263436
• ISBN13: 9780486263434
• Release Date: August 1990
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.52 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.4" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

excellent reference for the model maker

Requires a basic knowledge of ship's rigging to be useful; but for the modeller, it is an excellent reference work for specifics of the rigging of various blocks,pendants, etc. it even tells your how to build-up specific types of rigging. Not a good primary reference but is good as additional information.

Rigging For Historians

The book does not go into great detail, but does give an excellent idea of how square-riggers were rigged. It is more of an historical document than it is a descriptive analysis of how such ships were rigged and should be bought on that basis.

Brilliant

This book is brilliant. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the rigging of ships. Perhaps not so useful in the real world today, but full of great information and lots of practical knowledge should you find yourself stranded on a Nineteenth Century bark with no one else who understands rigging. Also beneficial for those who enjoy building ship models. A very excellent volume to have on your home library shelves with which to impress your friends and neighbors, too. Buy it, you won't be disappointed.

A Time Machine to the Age of Sail

When you open the pages of "The Art of Rigging," you step back in time over two hundred years. The language herein is that of mariners of the days of wooden ships. You must learn the language to fully appreciate the treasure that is this book.The author or, more properly, reviser, Captain George Biddlecombe, Royal Navy, died in 1878. This book, first published in 1848 by another author, Charles Wilson, was based on a rigging manual published in 1794. It was again revised and published in 1925.If you are expecting modern terms, word usage, and grammar, forget it! This is the real stuff, exactly as done and recorded by the men of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.If you are expecting an easy read on the order of "Dick & Jane and Their Dog Spot," forget it! This book is hard work, even the pictures can be difficult, but it is a varitable gold mine of information if you're willing to dig.Here is a quotation that I found particularly opaque until I translated it into modern English: "Burton pendants are triced up by the girtlines, and placed over the top-mast-head, that the thimbles may hang on each side, to hook the burton-tackles in."Poetry! I leave it to you to perform your own translation!If you believe that there is no gain without pain, this book is for you. If you want your pablum spoon-fed to you, you'd best be advised to buy a plastic model.(...)