New AcquisitionsShip – 5,000 years of Maritime Adventure; Brian Lavery; Dorling Kindersley Ltd; 2004; £25; CA 16498
A truly beautiful encyclopedia of anything that can be associated with ships and shipping. A more comprehensive and more superbly illustrated volume would be hard to imagine. Starting with the small vessels of ancient times from Egypt, Syria, West Africa and the Baltic and moving forward through significant maritime developments such as the journeys of the Vikings, seapower in the Mediterranean, the age of global exploration to colonisation and the development of Empire trade, the book is vast in its scope.
There is all manner of detail about significant vessels – the Vasa, the Victory, the Amsterdam, the Titanic, the Nautilus – about important navigational and cartographical developments, about the effect of trade upon sea-going craft and much more. A volume of 400 pages with hundreds of illustrations produced on high-quality paper, it is superb value for money as a reference book as well as steady reading.
Members who know the publisher’s ‘Eye Witness’ series of travel guides will be familiar with the format in half-scale. Brian Lavery is Curator of Naval History at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich which has collaborated in this publication and whence much of the material comes although the long list of acknowledgements indicates how widely the author has ranged for his sources.
Here is the perfect answer to the question ‘What shall I buy him/her for next birthday?’ - CH
Page prepared 14 February 2005
| New Acquisitions |