Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "Viking Naval Combat - A saga of dragonships (ft. Matt Easton)" video.

42:23 It won't burn through, like I said, there's always water there. The essential parts of the boat isn't really that flamable, not so much because of a lack of air, but simply because water that evaporates cools down its surroundings, and you need a certain amount of heat to keep a fire going, heat that's likely to vanish pretty fast in that enviroment... So just like you can use the stomach of a cow to boil water by filling it with water and then leaving it hanging over the flames (the water inside the stomach keeping it from burning) the water in and underneath the wood will keep the boat from burning except from fairly high in along the sides. No, I think just destroying the bottom of the boat with a big rock is a better approach. The weight will do more damage then the heat will.
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40:44 Well, we certainly use rocks as ballast in ships based on the viking design in my region in later centuries. They're basically just a layer at the bottom of the boat... We use them even in two man or one man boats, you just pick them up on a stony beach you're at then put them in the boat and try to ensure that they're mostly in the lowest part for a little added stability. But honestly where you are yourself is almost as important in those smaller boats.
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47:15 Yep, I'm proud of our heritage, but our ships most definitively wheren't intended for ship to ship combat. As the Hanseatic League clearly showed a some centuries later when they defeated the king of Norway... Our ships where meant to transport people and goods from A to B efficiently, being portable, fast, flexible etc. But not really places to fight... They might have feared better against the Anglo-Saxons or the Franks back then, but even so, if there's a risk of battle they'd probably prefer to either retreat or seek sturdy land to fight on instead of fighting in their ships...
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11:59 We have a long tradition of doing so here in Norway... There's actually several places named after the practice of doing just that... And we're talking about fairly sizable ships here. It might not be a option with a big knarr, but I can easily imagine a decent sized longship doing so since there's more length that you can position men along underneath the ship to help push against it. That said, there's probably a reason why Swedish and Danish viking ships tended to be a bit smaller then the Norwegian ones. Ours often had to deal with worse weather, so being a bit bigger was a good thing. Theirs had to deal with rivers and crossing land more often... So yeah...
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3:26 Actually, the first viking raids on the British islands predates Lindisfarne. And arguably the start of the era had more to do with attacks in what's today the Netherlands. And the conflics between the Danes and the Franks.
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55:52 I've only had a chance to crew a replica once, and only for a short while, and there wasn't any wind so we had to row... :-/ A pity really, since we where there to test out a sail and how effective it was, and therefore how likely it was to have really been used that way... (Woolen sail with sheep fat on it if I recall correctly, the hypothesis being something along the line that the sheep fat would make it more effective or some such, I don't know...) I got more experience with those ships from the 1800s or so...
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6:47 It's not just about lack of ports. It's also about the ability to be carried over land. If you are going along a coastline with a lot of fjords (Norway) and you can cut your travel time significantly and avoid bad weather potentially killing you and holding you back by simply dragging your ship across land for a short distance, then why not do so? And then there's rivers... And crossing between rivers. And so one and so forth. They where just usefull. Also, I believe the knarr had a keel shape that kind of made a extra "virtual" keel created by the water flow. So when sailing it behaves like it has a deeper ship then it really is. And since this effect is created by water flow you don't have to worry about it when the water is shallow. One downside is that you lose the effect if you're moving slowly... And, it's kind of tricky to pull off building it right.
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10:58 I'm not 100% sure with the viking ships, but with the local ships in my region in Norway that's pretty similar to viking ship design but that where created around 1800 due to change of available wood types you can usually move even the big ones over land with the crew of two of them. So if you have two, you'll go ashore, then use the whole crew from both ships to move one over land, then go back and use the whole crew of both ships on the other one, and you'll get them across. You'll be leaning your back against the side of the boat, pushing off with your legs, everyone at once.
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40:21 Not only are you not going to cry about it... You probably have a lot of them. Because these boats are so shallow you'll use a lot of rocks to help stabilize them, especially when you're trying to sail. For rowing it doesn't matter as much, but for sailing they're kind of vital when sailing up against the wind. And if you're fighting someone you might as well make use of said stones rather then wasting a arrow that takes a lot more effort to replace.
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@DarryllC I suspect that was more common on ships of other nations. The viking long boats where exposed to water at least occasionally almost everywhere. I mean sure, perhaps at the very front or rear the heat trick might have worked I guess in good weather... And if you loaded the ship with a lot of things that could burn, then that could probably produce enough heat to make the boat burn to a unsafe level... But the boats themselves aren't really designed in a way that should make them all that flammable I believe. Granted, I've never tried to actually test how flammable a viking longboat actually is... I didn't own the replica I was sailing once... And well, making such a ship is somewhat time consuming... You don't go about damaging something that's that high value if you can help it. It's bad enough with all the wear and tear on its own....
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23:22 Hum, it would depend a bit on the oars I think. I honestly haven't thought much about this before... But you have different oars for different jobs. Long distance rowing would involve ores that acts like springs, so they'll keep pushing the water after you stop moving, giving you a moment of rest while the tension is released against the water. On the other hand if you want to row fast with a lot of force in bad weather you'll want more solid oars that don't give way, and in the case of the Faero islands, perhaps you even go with smaller blades, so you can pull the oars up of the water, turn them around easily so the wind won't catch them so easily, move them forwards and down into the water again. And while this is something that did change quite a bit over the years, I don't think holes where used for the oars... There's a few different approaches I know of for ships in my region at later dates. But think two round pieces of wood stuck into the wood below and a flat piece of wood underneath the oar is one way to do it, and that way the wear and tear from the oars won't translate to wear and tear on the ship that can't be easily replacable. So while you can't really move the end in the water fast enough to avoid a incomming ship you could lift your own end up out of where they're lying (not sure about the english word for this), change the angle so it can move faster through the water and simply let the enemy ship push the oar backwards/forwards along the ship side while doing your best not to lose the oar overboard. At least that's how I imagine you'd do it... Of course that might be a bit tough to do while there's a angry guy with a sword standing there right next to you in the neighbouring ship that might cut you down while you're trying to keep that oar in your hands...
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10:13 Eh... There's some debate about this of course. But the school of thought I subscribe to is that the wood in the viking ships where under tension in order to get the desired hull shape. So while yes, you could take it apart fairly fast, reassembling it might take a bit more effort then you're giving them credit for.
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56:33 Afraid not... We ended up mostly just rowing...
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41:02 That's definitively the case, although honestly since the bottom of the boat is always filled with water anyway, having some rocks there is usefull just to keep your cargo somewhat dry.
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15:06 You can do a little bit more then that. But yeah, we're talking more like 12 knots top speed if I recall correctly, so it's not a lot faster... And yeah, 10 knots is probably a more likely speed, since the conditions required for 12 knots just isn't that common...
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50:46 Yeah, I love that part. ^^ The long serpent was built in my home city by the way.
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