tis_ appears to have been the largest.
Her dimensions are given as follows: length of keel, 70 ft.; length over
all, 110 ft.; width at prow and poop, 40 ft. This latter dimension is
hardly credible. The _Roccafortis_ had two covered decks, and a castle
or "bellatorium" at each end, and also several cabins. The crew numbered
110.

The Genoese ships were smaller. Two of them were of identical
dimensions, viz. length of keel, 49-1/2 ft.; length over all, 75 ft.;
beam, 10 ft. The figure given for the beam appears to be too small in
this case, if the dimensions of the mast, 70-1/2 ft., are correct, for
such a long mast could hardly have been carried in so narrow a boat.
These vessels had two decks, and are said to have had stabling for fifty
horses each; but this latter statement cannot be true if the dimensions
are accurately given.

We have very little information about the ships of the end of the
thirteenth and commencement of the fourteenth centuries. There is a list
in existence of Cinque Ports ships which were fitted out in 1299 to take
part in the war against Scotland. They were thirty in number. More than
half of them had complements of two constables and thirty-nine
mariners, and the smallest had one constable and nineteen mariners.
There is also a statement of the tonnage and complements of ships
intended for an expedition to Guienne in the year 1324, which throws
some light on the size of the vessels employed in the Scottish
expedition. From it we learn that a ship of 240 tons had 60 mariners and
officers; one of 200 tons, 50; vessels between 160 and 180 tons, 40; of
140 tons, 35; of 120 tons, 28; of 100 tons, 26; of 80 tons, 24; and of
60 tons, 21. From the above we may infer that the largest vessels in the
Cinque Ports' squadron of 1,299 were from 160 to 180 tons. The measure
of a ton in those early days was probably the cubic space occupied by a
tun of wine of 252 gallons in the hold of a ship.

We possess one representation of an English ship of the date of this
expedition to Guienne. It was engraved on the seal of the Port of Poole
in the year 1325 (Fig. 30). It is remarkable as the earliest known
instance of an English ship fitted with a rudder at the stern instead of
the side-rudder, or paddle, which had been in use from the very earliest
times. We also notice in this ship a further development of the stern
and forecastles, which, however, were not as yet fully incorporated with
the structure of the hull