The Port of Shanghai is China’s leading commercial and financial center, and it has been called the world’s fastest-growing economy. Shanghai’s architectural style is unique and recognizable in its range of height, design, color, and unusual features. Shanghai, which literally means the “City on the Sea,” lies on the Yangzi...
The history of classical antiquity is to a large extent a maritime history. From the Late Bronze Age to Late Antiquity, it was in many ways strongly influenced by the Mediterranean Sea, its conditions and opportunities. The mare mediterraneum was an essential factor for the emergence and development of numerous coastal...
The longitude problem haunted sailors for centuries. Without being able to establish longitude, captains of ships were going off something they called “dead reckoning”, which essentially meant they were guessing, steering the ship with their gut, and ships were forced to stick to the few safe routes everyone knew. The...
Originally called “Ugly Ducklings,” the Liberty ships when built, were expected to last one trip and to have no economical life after the war. However, as the record shows, the Liberty ships labored long and hard during the war and dominated the ocean highways of the world for over ten...
The Cape of Good Hope is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula in South Africa. It was initially called Cape of Storms, “Cabo Tormentoso” by the navigator Bartolomeu Dias who first reached it, without being able to round it, arriving from Europe in 1488. Its calming...
From the Middle Ages, the Netherlands became a pivotal region for European maritime trade because of its ideal geographic location between Scandinavia and the Baltic in the North (wood and cereal), and Portugal and the Mediterranean ports in the South (wine and salt). Moreover, the Dutch developed a system of...
The Port of Piraeus (PP), lying about 10 kilometers southwest of Athens, Greece, is one of the biggest and most important ports in Europe. Located just 7 km (5 miles) south west of Athens, Piraeus is in fact a limestone peninsula offering natural harbours which the Athenians exploited to create...