Tessarakonteres (Greek: τεσσαρακοντήρης, "forty-rowed"), or simply "forty", was a very large catamaran galley reportedly built in the Hellenistic period by Ptolemy IV Philopator of Egypt. It was described by a number of ancient sources, including a lost work by Callixenus of Rhodes and surviving texts by Athenaeus and Plutarch. According to these descriptions, supported by modern research by Lionel Casson, the enormous size of the vessel made it impractical and it was built only as a prestige vessel, rather than an effective warship. The name "forty" refers not to the number of oars, but to the number of rowers on each column of oars that propelled it, and at the size described it would have been the largest ship constructed in antiquity, and probably the largest human-powered vessel ever built.
Tessarakonteres (Greek: τεσσαρακοντήρης, "forty-rowed"), or simply "forty", was a very large catamaran galley reportedly built in the Hellenistic period...
the ASCII character with code 40 40 Harmonia, a main-belt asteroid Tessarakonteres (English: Forty), a very large ancient Egyptian galley Top 40: a radio...
Philopator (221-204 BC) on the occasion of the launch of the enormous Tessarakonteres rowing ship. However a more recent survey by Goodchild and Forbes does...
commentary. Ptolemy IV is said to have built a giant ship known as the tessarakonteres ("forty-rowed"), a huge galley and possibly the largest human-powered...
structural problems. Unlike other known super-ships of the Hellenistic age, Tessarakonteres and Syracusia, Leontophoros actually participated in battles (Plutarch...
[citation needed] He ordered the construction of a huge warship, the Tessarakonteres: 420 feet long, and bearing more than 4,000 oarsmen and 2,850 soldiers...
rowers and soldiers as in the Quadrireme and Quinquereme. The Ptolemaic Tessarakonteres was the largest ship constructed in Antiquity. New siege engines were...
Adonis to Alexandria and many of the women there partook in it. The Tessarakonteres, a gigantic catamaran galley designed by Archimedes for Ptolemy IV...
Global Information