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Schedules
From monday to sunday
from 10 to 19h -
Situation
Avinguda de les
Drassanes, s/n
08001 Barcelona
French model 118-gun, three-decker ship
Model ship, Unknown, 18th century
Llegir més
Num. inventory: 8185
Object name: model ship
Title: Ship
Object date: 18th century
Author: unknown
Technique and material: tortoiseshell, ivory, metal, plant fibre, bone, ebony and paint.
Model ships
Model prison ship or hulk, made of ivory and ebony probably at the end of the 18th century, a period of great wars between France and Great Britain when hundreds were made. Thousands of French seamen ended up as prisoners in ships that did not sail, but were used as floating prisons. As a distraction or to win some money, some built models using waste materials like animal and fish bones or leftover wood, with human hair for the rigging. Other model-makers copied this technique, using more noble materials like ebony, tortoiseshell or ivory. In this model, placed on a pedestal, the figurehead is of a soldier with a red helmet.
