Ancient Maritime Heritage is being honored as the Ministry of Culture, in collaboration with the Indian Navy and Goa-based Hodi Innovations, has recently launched a project to reconstruct ancient stitched ships that sailed the Indian oceans about 2,000 years ago.
About the Project:
- The project entails collaboration across several ministries and departments.
- Indian Navy: Overseeing the ship’s design and construction and also sailing the ship along ancient maritime trade routes.
- Ministry of Culture: Funding of the project.
- Ministries of Shipping and External Affairs: Supporting the project in its execution stage.
- National Implementation Committee: Approval of the project.
- The stitching work will be undertaken by a team of traditional shipwrights led by Babu Sankaran (an expert in the stitched ship technique).
- It will cost Rs 9 crore and is expected to take around 22 months to complete.
About the Voyage:
- Once the ship is ready, the voyage with a seam of 13 Indian Navy crew from Odisha’s Cuttack will be sent to Indonesia in 2025, to coincide with Kartik Purnima (full moon night of the Kartik month as per Hindu calendar).
- The voyage will be a part of the initiative to revive and honour India’s old maritime trade routes.
Ancient Stitching Technique:
- This age-old technique of shipbuilding involves shaping the wooden planks using the traditional steaming method to conform to the shape of the hull (Also called as Tankai Method).
- Each plank is then stitched to another using cords/ropes, sealed with a combination of coconut fibre, resin, and fish oil.
- It almost became extinct after the Britishers came to India, where the wooden planks were nailed to support the recoil of canons.
- The earliest known example of a sewn boat is the 40+ metres long funerary boat in Egypt (2,500 BC), later finds in other parts of the world include some early Greek ships.
- In Finland, Russia, Karelia and Estonia, small sewn boats have been constructed until the 1920s.
- Sewn boat construction techniques were used in many parts of the world prior to the development of metal fasteners, and continued to be used for small boats to reduce construction costs where metal fasteners were too expensive.
- The navigation techniques used for the voyage will also be in consonance with old times, also aiming to show the sophistication of India in this field at the time.
About Project Mausam:
- It was launched by the Ministry of Culture with an aim to reconnect, and re-establish communications between countries of the Indian Ocean and to create an understanding of cultural values and concerns.
- It aims to rebuild maritime cultural connections with the 39 countries bordering the Indian Ocean.
- According to the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), naval trade on the Indian Ocean dates to the 3rd century BC, when residents of the Indus Valley opened maritime trading with Mesopotamia, Egypt, East Africa, and the Roman Empire.
- Through these maritime trade networks, goods like medicine, aromatics, spices, wood, grain, gems, textiles, metal, and stones were exchanged.
- This trade also facilitated the exchange of religions, cultures, and technologies, contributing to the expansion of Buddhism, Christianity, and Hinduism.
- It is said to be India’s answer to the Maritime Silk Road of China, India plans to move for UNESCO to award transnational heritage status to Project Mausam, which was launched by India at the 38th World Heritage Session at Doha in June 2014.
Ref: Source
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