Time Team Special 59 (2014) - The Boats That Made Britain (Dover, Kent)

college archeologist are not logical  slows the research.  the study of old human cultures is not the way to build a boat

these snobby British assume the boat was made in England but who knows if it had been french made ?

There is an 63 program? I can't find it.

I wish they had told/shown us what failed with the modern materials that made the boat leak.

All the stupid academics, and others that refuse to believe that there were ships in the Bronze Age 2500 BCE, at an implied biblical timeline (before the Flood!, ~1987 BCE), and bronze cutting tools, then these are back to the most ancient of times, that even false history of Egypt 3000 BCE, that there were sailing and shipping. Maybe coastal, and some at the time of King David and Solomon 1000 BCE of the Iron Age, they were transoceanic sailing between western Old World to eastern New World, and eastern Old World to western New World. So there was sailing, shipping, cargo, immigration, emigration, economy, commerce, banishments, ....

I hate when they do stuff like this - they're "running out of time" so they use nylon rope & store bought caulk? WTF, extend the damn project or what's the point? All this work to fit the schedule of a TV show? We're talking about history making experimental archaeology & you ruin it because of a TV program!? How lame.


Edit: You redeemed yourselves in the end - good work!

Thank you for answering. We could have an interesting discussion, but you don't seem open to it. Actually, a story of God, Jesus Christ, and intelligent man from the beginning, is far more interesting than man gradually evolving into intelligence. Although the excitement of the story is not why I believe in Jesus; it is because He speaks to me and He has changed my life entirely over the past several years! His Presence in my life is very precious and comforting!! The Bible, although written over a period of many hundreds of years, and by many men as Jesus directed their thoughts, is one story, from Genesis through Revelation. One story of man's fall, and God's over all plan to restore us to Himself!! And what of Noah, the technology he used on that boat to sustain them for over a year? What of the technology Noah brought with him to build the pyramids? What an exciting story!! And Jesus, and His great love for us?

~~~ First boats? I know you won't agree, but the simple answer to the boat mystery is that the sons of Noah were master boat makers.

So the modern rope they went for was nylon...to be used in the ocean...huh.

Rule Britannia!

A lot Brits trying their best, but demonstrating several centuries distance from the skills my ngranfather taught me :-)

I found "Time Team" quite by accident about 6 months ago. I can't get enough of it. I love that it was such a well regarded show and has lived through 20 seasons. I think Tony the host makes the show. His past experience in television gives him an ease in front of the camera as well as a seemingly well rounded education and knowledge of archeology. The graphics makes it easier to understand what things looked like and brings a personal, visual touch to the series. Not sure if they're more episodes in the future but I really hope so.

I'm pretty sure, when they talk about inventing the wheel, they really mean inventing the axle. Man has used logs to roll under large objects forever. Axles were the breakthrough.

Question : Do you think that if they had soaked the final rope as they were "stitching" the boat, it could of made for tighter joining after it dried and was waterproofed, it might of given a better end result? 

I didn't realize they intended to actually put it in the water. I think they knew the first launch was doomed. Watching them paddle out it looked terribly unstable.
Great series and thank you so much for posting.

It's a beautiful boat, it really is.

I was shocked to see them use the nylon rope and other stuff though. After all that time and effort to recreate the original technologies, that "short cut" kind of ruined it all. Luckily it made them think it over and try again. The problem with nylon etc is, that it doesn't, as natural materials do, swell in contact with water. It's an awful mistake, really. But good job in trying again with the real stuff. Another plus to these boats, made with planks which were made with axes, is how they move "with the waves" rather than against them. The clinker-style boats of Scandinavia are famous for that, too.

One little bit of critique that I can't help is with the mumble-jumble of words in the intro: talking about nations at that time, shaking off the ancient and joining the modern world. Really? It may be so that the term nation can be applied to a group of people at that time from the English point of view (as far as I know, in the German discourse the concept of "nation" is only applied to such groups after the French revolution and it's basically a construct anyway) but it certainly is nonsense to speak of a concept like modernity in that time frame. Almost as awful as that small clip of the "cavemen", just reproducing the kind of stereotypes regarding our ancestors that you seek to abandon. People who survived only using the natural resources around them are in many ways more advanced than our "civilisation" which destroys full force the very world we're living in. there's no sense in that.

But hats off to the shipwrights and all the other experimental archaeologists doing such a marvellous job in recreating ancient technologies and showing just how diverse, complicated and sophisticated our ancestors really were. Thank you very much!

I believe that the people in the past were much smarter then us now. I think it has been very foolish of us to presume that we today , because of our so called technology, are so much more advanced then the primitive people of the past. I was always taught at school all about how uncivilised and brutish, the people in  the past were. How very narrow minded of us, to think that we are the smart ones. Programs like this show us up and make us recognise  that maybe, we are the limited ones. Keep up the discoveries on how the past is making us look really silly!!!!!, we may actually learn something.

They forget that people were much smaller then. About 5" 3"  100 lbs so the boat would have rode higher in the water and could carry more weight.

Bloody Mariner hipsters... (I jest, I joke)

Does anybody really know where and when the wheel was invented?