The word brigantine comes from brigand which means a pirate or a rabber, and in the XVI century it was the name for light pirate ships. Later when piracy stread to the calmless Atlantic ocean the type of the vessel changed but the name was kept. In the XVII-XVIII centuries the brigantine carried square sails on theboth masts, and the terms brigantine and brig (as a shorter version) were equally used. In the XVIII century the brigantine was introduced to the military fleet as a messenger and reconnaissance ship. By the middle of the XIX century the brigantine finally became a type of the sailing vessels: it is a small two-masts sailer with a square sail on the foremast and a fore-and-aft sail on the mainmast, with 350 tons of displacement. The brigantine now had a difference from the brig, it had no square main sail. Besides for the traditional transportation of goods the brigantine could be also used as a passenger ship. In the stern there would be a rather spacious mess-room for no less than 10 people. |
