Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University / PLEASE NOTE: Boston University Libraries did not receive an Authorization To Manage form for this thesis or dissertation. It is therefore not openly accessible, though it may be available by request. If you are the author or principal advisor of this work and would like to request open access for it, please contact us at open-help@bu.edu. Thank you. / 2031-01-01

<p>This dissertation focuses on the artistic, archaeological, and literary representation and commemoration of the Classical Athenian navy. While the project stresses the various and often contradictory ways in which the Athenians perceived and represented their navy, its larger purpose is to argue that the integration of multiple and various media has the potential to change long-standing interpretations of ancient societies and cultures. Relying on the literary evidence of the "Old-Oligarch" and Plato, scholars have traditionally held that the 5th-century Athenian navy and its rowers were viewed by their contemporaries as a "mob" and a locus for citizen "riff-raff." Yet careful consideration of the vases, monuments, and buildings of 5th-century Athens, as well as the literary output of the period, demonstrate that the navy held a far more complex, and at times even positive, position in Athenian society.</p> / Dissertation

In 1985, China¡¦s highest military policy body, the Central Military Commission (CMC), reached a major decision. This decision required the People¡¦s Liberation Army (PLA) to make a strategic transition from preparing for ¡§early, total, and nuclear war¡¨ to ¡§peacetime army building¡¨ with an eye towards preparing for local, limited wars. While former implies an ideology-driven, imminent and major continental war where a massive Soviet invasion from the north would be dealt with, the latter refers to the limited armed conflicts that may arise from the issues of national sovereignty and territorial integrity, disputes over economic resources, and securing of major manufacturing platforms and trade-related transportation routes. To the extent many of such issues, disputes, platforms, and routes are associated with China¡¦s costal and maritime regions, the PLA Navy (PLAN) in China¡¦s defense posture has become more pronounced. Subsequently, a substantial body of PLA literature has emerged to redefined the functions, warfare, arms, and organization of the PLAN. This dissertation examines the content of such literature and its actual behavior, especially in the third-wave war era.

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A 1998 joint survey undertaken by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology and Portuguese authorities located and identified the sunken remains of the Royal Navy frigate HMS Pallas (1757-1783) off of the Azorean island of São Jorge. Physical remains are so limited as to suggest that excavation would likely yield little new information. However, much documentary evidence has been preserved in Admiralty archives. Contemporary treatises about 18th-century British ship construction focus on glossaries of terms, scantling lists and design theory, and include only short sections on frigates insofar as they apply to those topics. They rarely address specific construction aspects. Most current works address individual aspects of ship construction for the period, but provide little significant detail about the frigate as a ship type. All of these works are useful and reliable, however none attempt to combine the ship with the crew, or pursue the complete history of one ship. As the flagship of a prototypical class, intended to address French superiority in cruiser design, it is reasonable to expect that a history of Pallas would exist with some analysis of how successfully these new frigates fulfilled the Royal Navy’s perceived need. However, to date there has been no attempt to consolidate the evidence of her 26-year career. This study provides a comprehensive history of a single ship from perceived need and conceived solution through design and construction. The ship’s logbooks and additional primary sources made it possible to accurately document and analyze Pallas’ activities, maintenance, modifications, and ultimately to draw conclusions about the overall effectiveness of the frigate type. I began with basic background information to establish the perceived need for a new frigate type, followed by an examination of the conceived design solution. A partial set of admiralty drafts served as a foundation from which to develop a more complete set of construction plans, a spar plan, and rigging plans. Comprehensive research into life aboard Royal Navy warships of the period provided a social context within which to examine the service history of Pallas. Finally, a review of the maintenance record and the events leading up to her sinking enabled an informed assessment of how well HMS Pallas fulfilled the perceived need for which she was developed.

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This thesis looks at how the Scottish state, with a long coastline, got away with a minimal naval footprint in a period when European navies were becoming large permanent institutions. Increasingly, Scottish authorities did this by relying upon the English Royal Navy. This thesis hopes to go some way to filling the lacuna in the historiography of the Royal Navy in the seventeenth century regarding Scotland. The Royal Navy in Scotland is used as a prism through which Scottish and British state development in the period of the union of the crowns is looked at. From the standpoint of 1707 Scotland is generally seen as being an underdeveloped state. Explanations of why this was tend to point to the regal union as a cause due to the removal of key elements of statehood to London, in particular the state's 'monopoly of violence'. This thesis suggests that Scotland did not lose its monopoly of violence and that, instead of being a sign of the regal union's failure, underdevelopment actually indicates success. The Royal Navy shielded Scotland from much of the maritime insecurity which would generate demands to create a significant Scottish naval force. However, this relative success was not indicative of British development providing structures to allow the Royal Navy to react well to Scottish defence needs. Multiple monarchy was a poor organisational structure and AngloScottish communication on naval matters was either poor or non-existent. Instead, geopolitical and strategic factors meant that much Royal Naval provision principally aimed at English defence also helped Scotland. That these factors did not lead to equal protection against all types of maritime threats offers an alternative explanation for the maritime tensions between England and Scotland in the 1690s which Eric Graham identifies with the imposition of English mercantilism on Scotland.

The Seven Years’ War represented a period of great mobilization of British sailors and soldiers. Not only did men need to be found to man the ships and garrison the forts in the Western Squadron and North America, but they also needed to be fed and kept healthy during the conflict. Due to poor living conditions aboard Royal Navy ships, expeditions to North America were met with disease that would drastically reduce the numbers of able seamen. This was compounded by demobilization that followed the War of the Austrian Succession, forcing the British forces to rely on impressment to augment their troop numbers. Though there was a concerted effort to take healthy men with seafaring knowledge, local magistrates and constabularies saw this as an opportunity to rid their towns of the unwanted, and the demands of manning an ever growing Navy forced the Admiralty to take the sick and infirm. British prisons during this time were rife with typhus and smallpox, and the guardships that the impressed men would travel to were also areas of infections. The Royal Navy vessels were typically overfilled with men, and the tight living conditions encouraged the diseases to spread, creating ships that were not a wartime asset, but a liability to arrive in friendly ports in North America. There, the infection would spread to the local population, causing continued manning problems for the British during the conflict, and strained relations between the Admiralty and local governors. The infected troops limited British military effectiveness, and threatened the success of operations, as seen in the delay of the siege of Louisbourg in 1757, and the defeat of the British forces outside Quebec City in 1760. The experience with disease within a wartime context allowed Britain’s emerging medical class to publish important research, leading to positive changes to shipboard hygiene and medicine by the end of the eighteenth century.

Op 1 Mei 1967 kon die Suid-Afrikaanse vloot sy een-en- twintigste verjaardag vier. Bloedjonk dus, as weermagsdeel; maar eweneens belangrik as integrale deel van ons land se Weermag en as tydelike tuiste jaarliks van honderde dienspligtige jong Suid-Afrikaners. 'n Honderd twee-en-sewentig jaar tevore - op 11 Junie 1795 - het 'n eskader van die Britse vloot sy verskyning in Simonsbaai gemaak. Dit was die begin van 'n vlootverbintenis tussen Brittanje en die latere Suid-Afrika wat, met 'n onderbreking van net drie jaar (1803-6), tot 1957 besonder heg sou wees, en wat selfs sedert die oorname van Simonstad nog steeds bly voortbestaan danksy die sg. Simonstad-ooreenkoms. In hierdie verhandeling word die eerste agt jaar van die Britse vloot se verblyf aan die Kaap - die beginjare van hierdie "verbintenis" - van naderby beskou.

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