Felucca
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Feluccas)
A felucca (Arabic: فلوكة) is a traditional wooden sailing boat used in protected waters of the Red Sea and eastern Mediterranean including Malta, and particularly along the Nile in Egypt, Sudan, and also in Iraq. Its rig consists of one or two lateen sails.
They are usually able to board ten passengers and the crew consists of two or three people. Despite being made obsolete by motorboats and ferries, feluccas are still in active use as a means of transport in Nile-adjacent cities like Aswan or Luxor. They are especially popular among tourists who can enjoy a quieter and calmer mood than motorboats have to offer.
[edit] San Francisco's feluccas
An often untold story is the large fleet of lateen-rigged feluccas that thronged San Francisco's docks before the construction of the state-owned Fisherman's Wharf in 1884. They were built by Italian immigrants (who called them "silenas"). According to Golden State historian Riccardo Gaudino, Italians from the western shores established colonies on maritime routes to the Pacific. The chain migration orginated from seafaring villages of Riva Trigoso at Sestri Levante on the Riviera (Genova), Isola della femina at Palermo (Sicily) and Ischia (Bay of Naples). The light small maneuverable feluccas were the mainstay of the fishing fleet of San Francisco Bay. "These workhorses featured a mast that angled, or raked, forward sharply, and a large triangular sail hanging down from a long, two-piece yard" as John Muir described them.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Muscat, Joseph (2003) The Gilded Felucca and Maltese Boatbuilding Techniques. Pubblikazzjonijiet Indipendenza, Malta. ISBN 99932-41-45-8
[edit] External links
