Seafaring

Seafaring: what a cool word!

Sea comes from proto-Germanic saiwaz. Its origins before that are mysterious and ancient, but it’s probably a Proto-Indo European (PIE) word. We use it fairly commonly in English today.

Faring, on the other hand, comes from the Old English word faran, meaning "to journey” or just “to go.” It also traces its roots all the way back to PIE.

The word seafaring is ancient, and so is the practice.

How ancient?

We know for near-certain that modern humans crossed a significant portion of the Indian Ocean at least 65,000 years ago. How do we know this?

In a word: Australia. For millions of years now, the continent has remained unattached to Asia and Africa, and since the ancestors of modern humans initially evolved in Africa, the only way they could have reached Australia is by crossing a significant amount of open water.

The vast oceans would have been broken up by more islands back then—sea levels were lower—but there would have still been thousand-mile stretches of open water for these ancient ancestors of modern Aboriginal Australians to navigate.

We know that humans were on the continent at least 65,000 years ago, and the tools found in Australia indicate a high level of skill—high enough to build a boat of some kind.

Our Neanderthal cousins may have gotten around by boat in the Mediterranean around 100,000 years ago. There are Neanderthal-specific stone tools all over the islands there, and it’s reasonable to speculate that they might have traveled there by boat. The more we learn about these folks, the smarter they seem.

There’s more speculative evidence suggesting that our seafaring goes back much further—as much as 800,000 years! Homo erectus may have used rafts to cross bodies of water and reach islands in Southeast Asia. Homo erectus was generally more intelligent than earlier hominids, with larger brain sizes and more advanced toolmaking capabilities, and there’s no way anyone could have reached some of these islands without a boat or raft.

Over time, seafaring became more systematized and far-reaching. 5000 years ago, the ancient Egyptians were trading all around the Mediterranean Sea. The Phoenicians were amazing sailors who went all the way to Britain—again, trade brought the necessary incentive to continue reaching a little further over time.

And then, there are the Polynesians. Beginning 5000 years ago, and continuing to evolve all the way into the last millennium, these incredible navigators traveled thousands of miles across the Pacific Ocean, aided by little more than their knowledge of the celestial bodies and incredibly crafted canoes.

Here’s a great video explaining how those Polynesian navigators made their way around the biggest body of water we have:

All of these incredible ancient ancestors of ours did the most amazing things on the open water. It’s tough to put ourselves in their position—we’re used to having reliable, safe transportation everywhere we go, whether on land, sea, or air.

These folks did not have the certainty that they’d be coming back home, but they did some incredible things in order to innovate. They were unbelievably clever about solving insurmountable problems.

We owe them everything.