Roman ships and ocean travel

[vanvincent]

For game purposes, I'm looking into the (im)possibilities of Romans (ca. first or second century AD) sailing to the New World. I've been reading a book lately on Roman trade in the Indian Ocean ("The Roman Empire and the Indian Ocean" by McLaughlin) that suggests that the Romans had pretty big oceangoing sailing ships navigating the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. Of course, much sailing would have been in sight of land (around the Arabian and perhaps the Indian peninsula), but still, the Indian Ocean is an ocean and can get pretty rough. Would ships like these have been able to cross the Atlantic? If not, what important differences are there between these Roman trade ships and the caravels that eventually did make this crossing? And would Roman seamanship be up to navigating such a crossing?
Note: this is for fictional purposes only, I'm well aware there is no credible evidence for Romans actually sailing to America.
Thanks for any and all answers; references to books or internet resources where I can research further are also welcome!

 

[Calad]

First of those ships were not Romans. Rome took over Egypt and left infrastructure and local administration untouched. Ships that sailed into India were pre-Roman and Rome did not have any role of their development. Mediterranean world and Red sea sailors were two completely different systems, both developed independently.

 

[krieger11b]

Well if Rome was still a powerhouse a couple centuries later than it was then I figure they might have. Say if they switched from being a empire funded in large part from plunder and slaves from war into one centered around trade they might have built ships more meant for ocean rather than mostly coastal travel.

The problem is that owning the Western parts of the Middle East is that there isn't a huge motivation to find a way around it. Plus also Columbus said east because he was a terrible cartographer and though the world was far smaller than it really was, something the Romans knew empirically not to be true. Although so did astronomers and non idiotic cartographers. Your best bet is an easily duped rich Roman funding an expedition to just sail West and hope for the best.

 

[Finnish Dragon]

Well, ships are one thing and Roman ships were suitable for Mediterranean but not really for Atlantic Ocean. Romans feared the Atlantic Ocean since they thought that there was only ocean the continental islands of Europe, Africa and Asia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_world_maps#Eratosthenes_.28276.E2.80.93194_BCE.29

If Romans believed that Eratosthenes map was correct then they had no reason to sail to deep to the Atlantic Ocean. There would only be sea and possibly some superstitious mythological beasts. While Romans were excellent soldiers and engineers, they really weren´t very good sailors in the Atlantic Ocean.

If you sail in the ocean and you want to keep your heading steady, you will need a compass. The celestial navigation will help but it might not work every kind of weather like in rains and storms. Romans didn´t have compass for navigation since it was the Song dynasty in China which first used compass for navigation almost 1000 years after Roman empire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_compass

Another thing that you would need in Ocean sailing would be a good map. You would need be able to evaluate your position in the ocean as well. Generally, you can estimate your position in the north and south axis from the sun at the midday. It would be much more difficult to estimate your location in east and west axis. Estimating your location in east and west axis properly was discovered at the mid 18th century by the Royal Navy when they acquired marine chronometers. The idea was to compare the home port time by the chronometer and the local time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_chronometer

 

[Dracolithfiend]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periplus_of_the_Erythraean_Sea

Romans knew of dhow, they could build their own. Would they cross the Atlantic with them? Doubtful. They might have attempted to circumnavigate Africa though.

Does anyone have any sources for a Byzantine caravel perhaps?

 

[bz249]

Well if Rome was still a powerhouse a couple centuries later than it was then I figure they might have. Say if they switched from being a empire funded in large part from plunder and slaves from war into one centered around trade they might have built ships more meant for ocean rather than mostly coastal travel.

The problem is that owning the Western parts of the Middle East is that there isn't a huge motivation to find a way around it. Plus also Columbus said east because he was a terrible cartographer and though the world was far smaller than it really was, something the Romans knew empirically not to be true. Although so did astronomers and non idiotic cartographers. Your best bet is an easily duped rich Roman funding an expedition to just sail West and hope for the best.

Columbus might have been a terrible carthographer but he was an able sailor and from the rumors (remember it is the time when the Portuguese ventured further West in circumnavigating Africa*) he derived that there must be some land there. His mistake was that he did not considered the option that it is a new continent.

*indeed the answer for a what if no Columbus is that in this case a guy called Pedro Cabral would have discovered it 8 years later