Recently this year, Seaforth Publishing and Pen and Sword Books, Ltd. released the third printing of Lennarth Petersson’s book on square rigged ships, Rigging Period Ship Models. Mr. Petersson is a renowned draughtsman, modeler and has spent many years researching the intricacies of square rigged ships. Rigging Period Ship Models is the follow-up volume to his earlier publication, Rigging - Fore and Aft Craft, which focused on 18^th century British Naval Cutters, the French Luggers and the American Schooner.

Rigging Period Ship Models

By Lennarth Petersson

Published by , Pen & Sword Books, Ltd.

Copyright © Lennarth Petersson 2000

Reprint 2014, 2016

ISBN 978-1-8432-102-1

SRP - £25.00 / $35.98 US
 


Rigging Period Ship Models is a hardcover, 119-page illustrated compilation showing, with intricate detail, the complexity of rigging by using a period model of the British frigate Melampus as a baseline to show the rigging. After extensive research, Mr. Petersson chose the Melampus 36-gun frigate model to gather information for this book due to its accuracy. His premise to writing this book was to collectively bring as much information about traditional style square rigging into one book to serve as a referencing benefit to modelers.

 

Front to back, this book is filled with detailed illustrations showing all of the rigging components used on a British frigate similar to the Melampus. These drawing are presented in both 2D line drawings as well as in isometric formatting. Throughout the book, a close-up profile illustration of each type of rigging used on the ship is provided along with inset drawing of the rigging’s location on the ship. Each of these beautifully detailed line drawings are labeled to allow the reader to know names of each of the components used.

 

Conclusion

 

It is sufficed to say, a picture is worth a thousand words, and Lennarth Petersson presents just that. Rigging Period Ship Models is a beautifully illustrated manuscript detailing of the entire rigging layout for what was seen on a British Frigates of the 18^th and 19^th centuries in this book. He shows us fifty-four of the major components that make up a complete rig to these ships, presenting them in an incredibly easy to understand format. This book is an amazing reference for any modeler regardless of skill level. Mr. Petersson set out to create a guide for model shipwrights which focuses solely on the rigging of these ships after realizing there was specific guides in print that show all aspects to how these ships were rigged; he did exactly what he set out to do! This is definitely a must-have for any modeler looking for information which illustrates period ship model rigging.

 

Link to my review of Lennarth Petersson's - Rigging - Fore and Aft Craft