Inventions & Discoveries · Transport and navigation
Junk
A junk is a Chinese sailing ship with a central rudder, an overhanging flat transom, watertight bulkheads and a flat bottom, built with iron nails and clamps. It grew from tapering rafts rather than dugout canoes, and Chinese junks were at first river craft with square sails. Under the Song dynasty (960–1279) they took up ocean-going features from Southeast Asian ships: Zhu Yu's Pingzhou Table Talks, published by 1119, describes hulls divided by bulkheads, and the battened junk sail was adopted around the 12th century. Under the Yuan, Chinese trade ships displaced Southeast Asian ones on their Indian Ocean routes.
On the inventions tree
- First known
- by 1119
- Where
- China
- Credited to
- Song Dynasty
NoteA pottery model of a ship with a stern-mounted rudder from before the 1st century CE is already called a junk; the battened junk sail was probably Southeast Asian in origin, first shown at the Bayon temple at Angkor Thom.
See also
Cite this entry
- APA
- The Epoch Institute. (2026). Junk. In The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/junk-ship
- MLA
- “Junk.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/junk-ship. Accessed .
- Chicago
- The Epoch Institute. “Junk.” The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/junk-ship.
- Harvard
- The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Junk’, The Epoch Institute Encyclopedia. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/encyclopedia/junk-ship (Accessed: ).
Last reviewed October 2026Random entry ↻