Transport & space · c. 3,500 BCE

Sailing ships

Harnessing wind lets boats travel without rowers, the first engine of long-distance trade.

Square sails on reed and plank boats appear on the Nile and in Mesopotamia by the late 4th millennium BCE. Wind power let ships carry heavy cargo like grain, timber and stone over long distances with small crews. Sail remained the dominant way to move goods across water for about 5,000 years.

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