Ancient naval inventions

This newsletter is entitled Not in the Script. That’s NITS for short – no offence, dear reader, but you are among a community of ‘nits’. Not the hair lice variety, heaven forfend, but the UK slang for ‘nitwit’, or fool. In the nicest, smiley way of course.

Read on, because here we’re going to look at some inventions which, when just a daft idea, might have brought a resounding ‘Nitwit’ response! Especially the ones in my historical novels.

Harpax, not Harpic

So, the Harpax. Not to be confused with the toilet cleaning brand. The Harpax was far more devastating.

This was a Roman catapult-fired grapnel that Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa used to great effect to snare enemy ships, first at the Battle of Naulochus (Sicily, 36BC) to defeat the pirate Sextus Pompey, and then at the Battle of Actium (31BC) when Rome’s fleet clashed with the huge ships of Mark Antony and Cleopatra. These battles are pivotal in my Vipers of Rome and Sea of Flames novels.

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‘Harpax’, or ‘harpago’, means ‘gripper’. Appropriate if ‘Agrippa’ was the genius behind it (geddit?).

The historian Appian of Alexandria describes it as “a piece of wood, five cubits long bound with iron and having rings at the extremities. To one of these rings was attached the grip itself, an iron claw, to the other numerous ropes, which drew [the captured ship] by machine power after it had been thrown by a catapult and had seized the enemy’s ships.”

It was also used to capsize enemy ships which makes sense given that the quickest way to defeat a floating fortress crammed with armoured soldiers is to deposit them all in the briny.

Where it began

In Vipers, I describe Agrippa’s new naval base at Portus Julius – near modern-day Naples – where Agrippa built a new navy to enable Caesar Octavian to at last defeat Sextus’s Sicilian revolt. Portus Julius is worthy of a separate post in its own right as an astonishing engineering feat (bear with me). It was here that Agrippa developed his Harpax weapon. Clever chap.

But did he? Readers will soon discover that I am fond of characters who show innovation and inventiveness, thinking ‘outside the box’ to overcome a problem or find a better way of doing things. Like Melqart in Libertas, who invents the earliest concept of a torpedo, the hot shower, the retractable keel and an ancient form of morse code (yup, posts will follow eventually!).

Some may think all this is over the top. But my grandfather was an inventor whose life-saving contraption was scoffed at before being stolen by a wealthy American; my mother was forever finding ingenious ways to make our home easier to manage; and my older brother just can’t help himself with his know-how in electronics engineering.

However, my inventions are all borne out of a wild and crazy imagination and sounded feasible when I thought of them.

Here’s what I want to know from you, dear reader: Have you invented anything, either in real life, in your imagination, or in fiction?

Leave your answer in the comments section below. And share this with anyone you know who is the mad professor-type, or just interested in ancient engineering. I don’t charge for my posts here, it’s all free, and you can find links to my historical fiction and social media here.

Until next time…