Inventions & Discoveries · Transport and navigation

Sail

6th millennium BCE · 1st century

A sail is a tensile structure of fabric or another membrane that uses the wind to propel a craft; sailing boats appear on Cucuteni–Trypillian ceramics from the 6th millennium BCE, and excavations of the Ubaid period in Mesopotamia give direct evidence of them. When and where the sail was invented is not known. Sails are depicted in Egypt around 3200 BCE, on reed boats sailing up the Nile against its current. Austronesian crab claw sails, used with outriggers and catamarans, carried settlers from Taiwan as far as Polynesia and Madagascar.

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First known: 6th millennium BCE
Where: Mesopotamia and eastern Europe

Also arose independentlyTaiwan and Island Southeast Asia (Austronesian sails) (c. 3000 BCE)

NoteWhen and where the sail was invented is not known; many date it no earlier than the 5th millennium BCE.

Led toOutrigger canoec. 3000 BCE Triremelate 8th century BCE Sternpost rudder1st century CE Lateen sail2nd century CE Windmill9th century Steamship1783

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See also