Buy Caravela XV Century (25)

This is a framed colour, technical drawing of a Portuguese Caravela of the XV century. I have used mechanical pencils to draw the detail in the rigging, the sails and the hull and then subsequently used colour pencils to add colour and shade for the final effect. This particular drawing took me approximately five hours to complete and is drawn on an A3 sheet of white paper.

The caravela played a key role in the early voyages of maritime exploration. The caravela's sturdy build and lateen sails proved well suited for the rough seas and contrary winds encountered by the early explorers who navigated their way southward along the African coast and beyond.

The caravela in this drawing is typical of those early vessels that discovered the Atlantic islands of the Azores, Madeira and buy the Canary Islands, and explored the western coast of Africa during the 15th century. As mentioned above, the caravela was ideally suited to tackle the rough seas and contrary winds thanks to their sturdy build and lateen sails which allowed them to sail against the wind. They also had the advantage of having a low drought which permitted them to explore the African interior by sailing upriver. It was with vessels such as these that the Portuguese were able to establish the first sub-Saharan Afro-European relations and the first overseas empire in the 15th century.