BRENDAN VOYAGE
Author(s): SEVERIN T
Could an Irish monk in the sixth century really have sailed all the way across the Atlantic in a small open boat, thus beating Columbus to the New World by almost a thousand years? Relying on the medieval text of St. Brendan, award-winning adventure writer Tim Severin painstakingly researched and built a boat identical to the leather curragh that carried Brendan on his epic voyage. He found a centuries-old, family-run tannery to prepare the ox hides in the medieval way; he undertook an exhaustive search for skilled harness makers (the only people who would know how to stitch the three-quarter-inch-thick hides together); he located one of the last pieces of Irish-grown timber tall enough to make the mainmast. But his courage and resourcefulness were truly tested on the open seas, including one heart-pounding episode when he and his crew repaired a dangerous tear in the leather hull by hanging over the side--their heads sometimes submerged under the freezing waves--to restitch the leather. A modern classic in the tradition of Kon-Tiki, The Brendan Voyage seamlessly blends high adventure and historical relevance. It has been translated into twenty-seven languages since its original publication in 1978.
With a new Introduction by Malachy McCourt, author of A Monk Swimming
Product Information
The route they chose was the 'Stepping Stone' route (Hebrides, Faroes, Iceland and along the coast of Greenland). It is also a story of historical and archaeological interest which proves that it could be possible for the mediaeval account of the legendary voyage of the Irish monk, St. Brendan, to have been a fairly factural record of a voyage to North America centuries before the Vikings.
General Fields
- :
- : Random House Publishing Group
- : Random House Publishing Group
- : April 2000
- : 1.7 Centimeters X 14.2 Centimeters X 20.4 Centimeters
- : books
Special Fields
- : SEVERIN T
- : Paperback
- : 304