| Abstract: |
This paper examines the distribution of Southeast Asian sail types and maritime vocabularies across the wider Indian Ocean. In terms of solid archaeological evidence, very little of the sails used by pre-modern seafarers is known beyond any doubt. By bringing together data and inferences from maritime archaeology, iconography, and, especially, historical linguistics, I offer some interdisciplinary perspectives on the history of sailing technology in this part of the world. I demonstrate that several types of spritsails spread from insular Southeast Asia, where they were invented, to the Southeast Asian mainland, the Indian subcontinent and the western Indian Ocean. This is partly supported by lexical data relating to rigging terminology, which suggests a particularly active role of Malay-speaking sailors in the dispersal of nautical technology. The evolution of the lateen sail in the western Indian Ocean, which superficially resembles Southeast Asian sail types, appears to have been a separate development.
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