HMS Challenger (1858)
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HMS Challenger was a Pearl-class corvette of the Royal Navy, launched on 13 February 1858 at Woolwich Dockyard. She carried the first global marine survey, organised by the Royal Society in the 1870s.
Painting of Challenger by William Frederick Mitchell
HMS Scout, a sister ship of Challenger
Figurehead (object)
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A figurehead is a carved wooden decoration found at the bow of ships, generally of a design related to the name or role of a ship. They were predominant between the sixteenth and twentieth centuries,
HMS Challenger (1858)
…sailors, when she embarked on the 68,890-nautical-mile (127,580 km) journey. The United States Space Shuttle Challenger was named after the ship. Her figurehead is on display in the foyer of the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton. The Challenger expedition, which embarked from Portsmouth, England on 21…
Figurehead on a model of the French ship Océan
A ship with oars bears the fierce lioness that appears as a figurehead on two Ancient Egyptian ships in a c. 1200 BC depiction of the victory over the invading Sea Peoples in a battle at the Nile River Delta.
The ceremonial barge used during the annual Phaung Daw U Pagoda festival in Myanmar uses a figurehead at right of a karaweik, a mythical bird.
The figurehead of the Greek brig Aris, c. 1807. National Historical Museum, Athens