A History of the World in Sixteen Shipwrecks by Stewart Gordon (review)

The test of Stewart Gordon’s A History of the World in Sixteen Shipwrecks is whether the book delivers on its promise to demonstrate global integration through the lens of sixteen surprisingly different shipwreck case studies . . . and it does. Of course, it is a selective history, as the title states sixteen shipwrecks and not sixty, but the format meets the objective well. Each of these wreck studies opens a window to a particular part of a long arc of transition from local to regional to global maritime human activity, as nautical technology evolved to allow broader participation in the maritime world.

This is chiefly the history of the world told in case studies, each of which begins with the technical evolution of the ship before transitioning to historical connections. The focus on material culture explains some of the absence of social history, such as the adventures of Jack Tar ashore, or the politics of piracy. Ship evolution has of course been a part of longer more specialized works (Richard Woodman’s The History of the Ship [1997] and Lincoln Paine’s The Sea and Civilization [2013] are particularly notable), but here Gordon writes for a more general public, as well as historians with a penchant for global studies. In a nutshell, Sixteen Shipwrecks provides an enjoyable and easily accessible short introduction to the roles of maritime history and nautical archaeology in a global history context. Well-chosen illustrations assist readers new to the maritime field, and endnotes cite a range of major sources and authorities for more information.

Most chapters provide an introduction to a specific wreck, notes on its discovery and archaeological interpretation, and a broader discussion of the vessel type, in a manner that allows the author to draw salient connections to local, regional, and global history. Sometimes major events are tied to individual ships, as with the Lusitania, World War I, and the onset of submarine depredations in the Atlantic. Elsewhere it is the vessel type that is the focus, as with the Bremen Cog, the Hanseatic League, and the beginnings of the merchant navy. The material culture of each site often includes the cargo, opening discussions on production and consumption, and trade patterns. Chapters conclude with an “ending of the age” section, describing how that particular nautical technology eventually passed from dominance.

The variety of Gordon’s selections in Sixteen Shipwrecks is interesting. Case studies run a range from dugouts to funeral barges to war junks to ships of the line to river steamboats to passenger liners. One “wreck” is not even a wreck at all, but a collection of merchant documents describing the loss of vessels in the ancient Persian trade world. Variation adds spice to the telling. Concluding with the Exxon Valdez and the Costa Concordia reveals the author’s effort to integrate maritime and mainstream history. Nautical evolution is not some antiquarian oddity, but a transforming influence leading directly to how we use the ocean today. Some elements, though, are lost. The lore of wooden vessels vanishes almost completely behind a steel wall of characterless floating boxes as cargo and passenger marine transportation attain maximum efficiencies.

Several maritime maxims are called out to good purpose by the author: the conservative nature of nautical technology and ship design, for the price of failure may be death; the uniquely Western creation of the large armed merchant galleon, a precursor to an equally unique private commercial navy; the balance between speed and armament in the race for resources; the emergence of global trade and global conflict first in the maritime environment. Some might contend with the choice of one wreck site over another: Why not the Quanzhou wreck from medieval China? Or the Arabian Belitung wreck? A Pacific voyaging canoe? A container ship? A Western whaler? But we all have our favorites, and elements of those technologies are often covered within the contents of other chapters. In the end it...