The Building of Boats: An Illustrated History of Boatbuilding

The Building of Boats: An Illustrated History of Boatbuilding Hardcover – January 1, 1979
by Douglas Phillips-Birt (Author), Profusely illustrated (Illustrator)
Publisher ‏ : ‎ W.W. Norton; First Edition (January 1, 1979)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0393032434
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0393032437
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 15.8 ounces
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Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2009
Though dated (it was published in 1979), Douglas Phillips-Birt's "Building of Boats" is the most detailed introduction I have seen to the way small craft evolved from the point of view of the difficulties faced by the constructor. Other volumes describe the advantages of various craft on the water, but short of the level of an engineering treatise, none that I know explain how they were put together so well.

Phillips-Birt is one of those English engineers who write with an elegant style noticeably absent among American engineers. Presumably he developed it at school, since in the old way he got his engineering training in a building yard (Vosper Thorneycroft) not a college.

Phillips-Birt finds the origins of boats in four ancestors: floats, bark, rafts and dugouts. Only the latter two had any technological future before the invention of modern materials, but Phillips-Birt notes that by the 20th century, floats were enjoying a big revival.

"The Building of Boats" is world-wide in scope but concentrated on the carvel tradition that originated in Egypt and the clinker tradition that came from northwestern Europe. The Celtic tradition was only barely exposed when he wrote, although since then there have been a number of archaeological discoveries that help fill out the story of inland navigation. However, Phillips-Birt writes mostly about boats that ventured on big water.

Although he writes with admiration for the feel of wood that the constructors of boats attained, especially the clinker-shell constructors, who let the wood form the shape rather than impose a shape from molds; Phillips-Birt does not delve into the exquisite shaping that some later investigators have claimed to detect in Micronesian canoes. Whether these subtleties are really there is a question he could have tackled, I think.

The illustrations are numerous and mostly good, and some of the anecdotes are amusing. However, my copy (of the first American edition) is one of the most ill-printed modern books I have seen, with garbles and missing lines that I thought had disappeared with the invention of machine-set type.