The life of galley rowers became synonymous with hard labor. But no one seriously thinks: were the rowers on the galleys forced? Or were the galley slave myths just military disinformation? Homer also described ships with 20, 50, 118 oars. Probably, they mean biremes, the rowers on which were located in two rows.
In Egyptian papyri, there is a mention of the fact that under the rulers Ptolemy II (285-246 BC) and Ptolemy IV (222-203 BC), ships were built with 4 thousand rowers, that is, with the population of an average antique city. The reality of the existence of such warships with slave rowers is very small.
The most common type of warship in the Greek and Roman eras are triremes, or, as the Greeks called them, triremes, with three rows of rowers. Usually the crew on a trier consisted of 150-170 rowers, 18-50 soldiers and about 12-16 sailors. It is not difficult to calculate how many warriors can fit on a ship with 4 thousand rowers, if any really existed.
Slave rowers could easily overwhelm the ship's soldiers and sailors. Especially this opportunity was provided during the assault on the enemy coast. After all, then it turns out that the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, leaving ships for slaves, deprived themselves of escape routes and at any moment could receive a blow from the rear.
You can, of course, write off all this on fanaticism, cruelty and ruthlessness to their subordinates by the generals of antiquity. Although, most likely, the galley rowers were not at all dumb slaves, but perfectly trained "paratroopers".
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Navigation in ancient times was carried out mainly by two types of ships: the military, which had elongated proportions, a detachable mast and oars as the main means of transportation, and merchant - shorter and wider, moving with sails.
A kind of antique special forces were transported on galleys, which were the first to land on foreign territory, and already the rest of the troops were brought up on merchant ships. It was advantageous for the attackers that the enemy considered the rowers to be slaves and measured the number of troops only as "regular" soldiers, which means that when repelling a strike, he would display the corresponding number of his own, while on the defensive.
The unexpected appearance of strong, athletic, due to their main occupation, and even trained in the rules of hand-to-hand combat, rowers led opponents to panic, and often to a disorderly retreat.
A description of the rowers' attack on the Phoenician military expedition to the island of Sicily can be found in the works of the Greek historian Diodorus of Sicily (about 90-30 BC): “The rowers came out of the sea, and the coast was filled with the blood of the defeated, the soldiers who defended their land.”
There are also mentions that Julius Caesar attacked the pirates of the island of Farmakoussa in 4 galleys, which had about 500 soldiers on board, and defeated them. If the rowers in Caesar's galleys were slaves, would not the notorious thugs who had nothing to lose could not cope with a handful of Roman soldiers from 4 galleys?
In a later period, there were many descriptions of the suffering of rowers on galleys, in particular, of captured Zaporozhye Cossacks, whom the Turks were shackled, beaten with whips, barely fed and given no water.
It is inconceivable that the crew of a modern warship would do nothing but damage the engine of their own ship. But the rowers were a kind of engine on the galley, and the galley, we recall, was a military vessel. It was simply unprofitable to use it in the merchant marine - rowers took up too much space, and the goods transported in galleys would be truly gold.
If rowers are not given enough water, poorly fed and kept in shackles, from which wounds are formed, sometimes fatal due to blood poisoning, this means depriving your ship of additional power.
During the period of military campaigns, this is an unaffordable luxury, since it is not so easy to find a replacement for a retired rower, because rowing requires experience and skill. And the danger of a slave rower revolt could put the success of even a well-planned military operation at stake.
However, the Romans later forgot the experience of Caesar's naval victory. Most often, slaves were rowers on Roman military galleys. The heavy, slow ships had several sailors and a Marine Corps unit.
Interestingly, the powerless rowers were better fed than the crew of free Romans. The physical activity on the oars was incredible, and the slaves needed a high-calorie diet. At maximum speed, the mighty oarsmen often died from overexertion.
However, it was not often possible to catch up with fast pirate ships. They had less weight and more oars, and most importantly, rowers were also part of the team. Therefore, during a boarding battle, the pirate team always had a numerical superiority.
Therefore, for centuries the pirate republics of the Mediterranean terrorized merchant ships. Until they began to use warriors instead of rowers.
Mark Rapport