1.
French cruiser Jeanne d'Arc (R97)
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Jeanne dArc was a helicopter cruiser of the French Navy. She was the vessel of the French Navy named after Joan of Arc. In peacetime, Jeanne dArc was used for teaching and training purposes, however, in case of emergency or crisis, toward the end of her service life Jeanne dArc became unsuitable for the role due to the increasing size and weight of helicopters. Jeanne dArc was built as La Résolue, as her predecessor and she was renamed Jeanne dArc in 1964. The ship was retired in May 2010 and decommissioned in September 2010, initially, she was also able to carry landing troops and Sikorsky or Super Frelon helicopters. Jeanne dArc could carry roughly 10 light or heavy helicopters and simultaneously handle the takeoff, following the development of the anti-ship missile Exocet, Jeanne dArc was fitted with the system in 1974. In 2008, Jeanne dArc was deployed in a role in the Gulf of Aden. The ship was used as part of the effort of Le Ponant during the April 2008 hostage-taking incident. A Gazelle helicopter from Jeanne dArc carrying snipers chased and captured pirates who had escaped on 4x4 vehicles after the hostages had been freed, Jeanne dArc commenced her final cruise on December 2009. The last trip included visits to Africa, South America including Rio to Buenos Aires, Lima, the French Antilles, the deployment was completed in May 2010 with a return to the port of Brest in France on 27 May 2010. On its final mission, Jeanne dArc, continued to perform in its role as a vessel for French navy midshipmen. On this final voyage she was accompanied by the frigate Courbet, the helicopter carrier Jeanne dArc was formally removed from active service in the French Marine Nationale on 7 June 2010. The necessary disarmament operations were formalised by decree of the Ministry of Defence on 4 June 2010 and announced in the Official Bulletin or the Marine Nationale, Edition No.26 on 25 June 2010. On 1 September 2010, at 11,30, Jeanne dArcs colours and name were withdrawn and this last ceremony of the colours on Jeanne dArc was held in the ships home port of Brest. Following disarmament in lArsenal basin at Brest the ship continued to be moored at the naval base, the task of establishing an inventory of hazardous materials present on the vessel will take place in the naval yards prior to dismantling the hull and could take up to two years. A tender will then be spent for its dismantling, the French Navy currently has 76 hulks ready to be dismantled. The issue remains sensitive following problems arising from the disposal and dismantling of the former Clemenceau, in 2014 it was decided that Jeanne dArc would be dismantled at Bordeaux by the Bartin Recycling Group and Pétrofer, subsidiaries of Veolia Group. The contract was worth approximately 11.5 million Euros
2.
Pennon
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A pennon or pennant is a flag that is larger at the hoist than at the fly. It can have several shapes, such as triangular, tapering or triangular and it was one of the principal three varieties of flags carried during the Middle Ages. Pennoncells and streamers or pendants are minor varieties of this style of flag, the pennon is a flag resembling the guidon in shape, but only half the size. It does not contain any coat of arms, but only crests, mottos and heraldic, pennon comes from the Latin penna meaning a wing or a feather. The pennon was sometimes pointed, but more generally forked or swallow-tailed at the end, in the 11th century, the pennon was generally square, the fly end being decorated with the addition of pointed tongues or streamers, somewhat similar to the oriflamme. During the reign of Henry III, the acquired the distinctive swallow-tail. Another version of the pennon was introduced in the 13th century. In shape this was a triangle, obtained by cutting diagonally the vertically oblong banner. The pennon was a personal ensign. A pennoncell was a diminutive pennon carried by the esquires, pennons were also used for any special ceremonial occasion, and more particularly at state funerals. For instance, there were XII doz, among the fittings of the ship that took Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, to France in the reign of Henry VII was a great streamer for the ship 40 yards in length 8 yards in breadth. Besides the white ensign, ships commissioned in the Royal Navy fly a long streamer from the maintopgallant masthead and this, which is called a pennant, is in fact the sign of command, and it is first hoisted when a captain commissions his ship. Now, however the pennant is a long white streamer with the St Georges cross in the inner portion close to the mast, pennants have been carried by men-of-war from the earliest times, prior to 1653 at the yard-arm, but since that date at the maintopgallant masthead. There are other navies that also fly pennant in a similar manner, the commissioning pennant in ships may end in a point, but they can also be forked, in which case it is also called a banderole. Pennants are also associated with American sports teams, such as Major League Baseball, in Australian rules football, a pennant is awarded to the winner of major competitions. For many years, this was the prize given. As a result, a League Championship is often referred to as a pennant, as in, and in Australian football, a premiership can also be referred to as a flag. In the Netherlands, an orange pennon is always used on the Kings Day and it is flown alongside the standard Dutch flag
3.
Mast (sailing)
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The mast of a sailing vessel is a tall spar, or arrangement of spars, erected more or less vertically on the centre-line of a ship or boat. Its purposes include carrying sail, spars, and derricks, and giving necessary height to a light, look-out position, signal yard, control position. Large ships have several masts, with the size and configuration depending on the style of ship, nearly all sailing masts are guyed. Until the mid-19th century all vessels masts were made of wood formed from a single or several pieces of timber which typically consisted of the trunk of a conifer tree. From the 16th century, vessels were built of a size requiring masts taller and thicker than could be made from single tree trunks. On these larger vessels, to achieve the height, the masts were built from up to four sections, known in order of rising height above the decks as the lower, top, topgallant. Giving the lower sections sufficient thickness necessitated building them up separate pieces of wood. Such a section was known as a made mast, as opposed to sections formed from pieces of timber. Jigger-mast, typically, where it is the shortest, the aftmost mast on vessels with more than three masts. On a two-masted vessel with the main-mast forward and a smaller second mast, such as a ketch, or particularly a yawl. Although two-masted schooners may be provided with masts of identical size, the aftmost is still referred to as the main-mast, schooners have been built with up to seven masts in all, with several six-masted examples. On square-rigged vessels, each mast carries several horizontal yards from which the sails are rigged. A two-masted merchant vessel with a sizable foresail rigged on a slightly inclined foremast is depicted in an Etruscan tomb painting from 475–450 BC. While most of the ancient evidence is iconographic, the existence of foremasts can also be deduced archaeologically from slots in foremast-feets located too close to the prow for a mainsail. Artemon, along with mainsail and topsail, developed into the rig of seagoing vessels in imperial times. The imperial grain freighters travelling the routes between Alexandria and Rome also included three-masted vessels, a mosaic in Ostia depicts a freighter with a three-masted rig entering Romes harbour. Special craft could carry many more masts, Theophrastus records how the Romans imported Corsican timber by way of a raft propelled by as many as fifty masts. Throughout antiquity, both foresail and mizzen remained secondary in terms of size, although large enough to require full running rigging
4.
Warship
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A warship is a naval ship that is built and primarily intended for naval warfare. Usually they belong to the forces of a state. As well as being armed, warships are designed to damage and are usually faster. Unlike a merchant ship, which carries cargo, a warship typically carries weapons, ammunition. Warships usually belong to a navy, though they have also operated by individuals, cooperatives. In wartime, the distinction between warships and merchant ships is often blurred, in war, merchant ships are often armed and used as auxiliary warships, such as the Q-ships of the First World War and the armed merchant cruisers of the Second World War. Until the 17th century it was common for merchant ships to be pressed into naval service, until the threat of piracy subsided in the 19th century, it was normal practice to arm larger merchant ships such as galleons. Warships have also often used as troop carriers or supply ships. The development of catapults in the 4th century BC and the subsequent refinement of technology enabled the first fleets of artillery-equipped warships by the Hellenistic age. During late antiquity, ramming fell out of use and the galley tactics against other ships used during the Middle Ages until the late 16th century focused on boarding. Naval artillery was redeveloped in the 14th century, but cannon did not become common at sea until the guns were capable of being reloaded quickly enough to be reused in the same battle. The size of a required to carry a large number of cannons made oar-based propulsion impossible. The sailing man-of-war emerged during the 16th century, by the middle of the 17th century, warships were carrying increasing numbers of cannon on their broadsides and tactics evolved to bring each ships firepower to bear in a line of battle. The man-of-war now evolved into the ship of the line, in the 18th century, the frigate and sloop-of-war – too small to stand in the line of battle – evolved to convoy trade, scout for enemy ships and blockade enemy coasts. During the 19th century a revolution took place in the means of propulsion, naval armament. Marine steam engines were introduced, at first as an auxiliary force, the Crimean War gave a great stimulus to the development of guns. The introduction of explosive shells soon led to the introduction of iron, the first ironclad warships, the French Gloire and British Warrior, made wooden vessels obsolete. Metal soon entirely replaced wood as the material for warship construction
5.
Chivalry
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Chivalry, or the chivalric code, is a code of conduct associated with the medieval institution of knighthood which developed between 1170 and 1220. The code of chivalry that developed in medieval Europe had its roots in earlier centuries, the term chivalry derives from the Old French term chevalerie, which can be translated to horse soldiery. Gautier states that emerged from the Moors as well as the Teutonic forests and was nurtured into civilization. Over time, its meaning in Europe has been refined to emphasise social and moral virtues more generally, in origin, the term chivalry means horsemanship, formed in Old French, in the 11th century, from chevalier, from Medieval Latin caballārius. In English, the term appears from 1292, thus, chivalry has hierarchical meanings from simply a heavily armed horseman to a code of conduct. Based on the three treatises, initially chivalry was defined as a way of life in which three essential aspects fused together, the military, the nobility, the religion. Gautiers Ten Commandments of chivalry are, Thou shalt believe all that the Church teaches, Thou shalt respect all weaknesses, and shalt constitute thyself the defender of them. Thou shalt love the country in which thou wast born, Thou shalt not recoil before thine enemy. Thou shalt make war against the infidel without cessation and without mercy, Thou shalt perform scrupulously thy feudal duties, if they be not contrary to the laws of God. Thou shalt never lie, and shalt remain faithful to thy pledged word, Thou shalt be generous, and give largesse to everyone. Thou shalt be everywhere and always the champion of the Right, though these ten commandments are often accepted to be what knights would use, these would not necessarily be what a knight actually followed in the medieval era. This code was created by Leon Gautier in 1883, long after the knight had ceased to exist in its traditional form. Chivalry in a sense was more of a subjective term. It is a version of the myth of the Golden Age, from Jean Charles Léonard de Sismondi, We must not confound chivalry with the feudal system. The feudal system may be called the life of the period of which we are treating, possessing its advantages and inconveniences, its virtues. Chivalry, on the contrary, is the world, such as it existed in the imaginations of the Romance writers. Its essential character is devotion to woman and to honour, Sismondi alludes to the fictitious Arthurian romances about the imaginary Court of King Arthur, which were usually taken as factual presentations of a historical age of chivalry. He continues, The more closely we look into history, the more clearly shall we perceive that the system of chivalry is an invention almost entirely poetical and it is impossible to distinguish the countries in which it is said to have prevailed
6.
Ship commissioning
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Ship commissioning is the act or ceremony of placing a ship in active service, and may be regarded as a particular application of the general concepts and practices of project commissioning. The term is most commonly applied to the placing of a warship in active duty with its countrys military forces, the ceremonies involved are often rooted in centuries old naval tradition. Ship naming and launching endow a ship hull with her identity, the engineering plant, weapon and electronic systems, galley, and multitudinous other equipment required to transform the new hull into an operating and habitable warship are installed and tested. The prospective commanding officer, ships officers, the petty officers, prior to commissioning, the new ship undergoes sea trials to identify any deficiencies needing correction. USS Monitor, of American Civil War fame, was commissioned less than three weeks after launch, regardless of the type of ship in question, a vessels journey towards commissioning in its nations navy begins with process known as sea trials. Sea trials begin when the ship in question is floated out of its dry dock, after a ship has successfully cleared its sea trial period, it will officially be accepted into service with its nations navy. At this point, the ship in question will undergo a process of degaussing and/or deperming, once a ships sea trials are successfully completed plans for the actual commissioning ceremony will take shape. If the ships ceremony is an affair the Captain may make a speech to the audience. Religious ceremonies, such as blessing the ship or the singing of hymns or songs. Once a ship has been commissioned its final step toward becoming a unit of the navy it now serves is to report to its home port. To decommission a ship is to terminate its career in service in the forces of a nation. Decommissioning of the vessel may also occur due to treaty agreements or for safety reasons, vessels preserved in this manner typically do not relinquish their names to other, more modern ships that may be in the design, planning, or construction phase of the parent nations navy. Prior to its decommissioning, the ship in question will begin the process of decommissioning by going through a preliminary step called inactivation or deactivation. The removed material from a ship usually ends up either rotating to another ship in the class with similar weapons and/or capabilities, or in storage pending a decision on equipments fate. During this time a crew may be thinned out via transfers. When a ship finishes its inactivation, it is then formally decommissioned, often, but not always, ships that are decommissioned end up spending the next few years in a reserve fleet before their ultimate fate is decided. Commissioning in the early United States Navy under sail was attended by no ceremony, thus, the ship was placed in commission. Commissionings were not public affairs, and unlike christening-and-launching ceremonies, were not recorded by newspapers, the first specific reference to commissioning located in naval records is a letter of November 6,1863, from Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles to all navy yards and stations
7.
Pennoncell
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A pennon or pennant is a flag that is larger at the hoist than at the fly. It can have several shapes, such as triangular, tapering or triangular and it was one of the principal three varieties of flags carried during the Middle Ages. Pennoncells and streamers or pendants are minor varieties of this style of flag, the pennon is a flag resembling the guidon in shape, but only half the size. It does not contain any coat of arms, but only crests, mottos and heraldic, pennon comes from the Latin penna meaning a wing or a feather. The pennon was sometimes pointed, but more generally forked or swallow-tailed at the end, in the 11th century, the pennon was generally square, the fly end being decorated with the addition of pointed tongues or streamers, somewhat similar to the oriflamme. During the reign of Henry III, the acquired the distinctive swallow-tail. Another version of the pennon was introduced in the 13th century. In shape this was a triangle, obtained by cutting diagonally the vertically oblong banner. The pennon was a personal ensign. A pennoncell was a diminutive pennon carried by the esquires, pennons were also used for any special ceremonial occasion, and more particularly at state funerals. For instance, there were XII doz, among the fittings of the ship that took Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, to France in the reign of Henry VII was a great streamer for the ship 40 yards in length 8 yards in breadth. Besides the white ensign, ships commissioned in the Royal Navy fly a long streamer from the maintopgallant masthead and this, which is called a pennant, is in fact the sign of command, and it is first hoisted when a captain commissions his ship. Now, however the pennant is a long white streamer with the St Georges cross in the inner portion close to the mast, pennants have been carried by men-of-war from the earliest times, prior to 1653 at the yard-arm, but since that date at the maintopgallant masthead. There are other navies that also fly pennant in a similar manner, the commissioning pennant in ships may end in a point, but they can also be forked, in which case it is also called a banderole. Pennants are also associated with American sports teams, such as Major League Baseball, in Australian rules football, a pennant is awarded to the winner of major competitions. For many years, this was the prize given. As a result, a League Championship is often referred to as a pennant, as in, and in Australian football, a premiership can also be referred to as a flag. In the Netherlands, an orange pennon is always used on the Kings Day and it is flown alongside the standard Dutch flag
8.
Mary Rose
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The Mary Rose is a carrack-type warship of the English Tudor navy of King Henry VIII. After serving for 33 years in wars against France, Scotland. While leading the attack on the galleys of a French invasion fleet, she sank in the Solent, the wreck of the Mary Rose was rediscovered in 1971. It was raised in 1982 by the Mary Rose Trust, in one of the most complex, the surviving section of the ship and thousands of recovered artefacts are of immeasurable value as a Tudor-era time capsule. The finds include weapons, sailing equipment, naval supplies and an array of objects used by the crew. Many of the artefacts are unique to the Mary Rose and have provided insights into topics ranging from naval warfare to the history of musical instruments, since the mid-1980s, while undergoing conservation, the remains of the hull have been on display at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. An extensive collection of well-preserved artefacts is on display at the nearby Mary Rose Museum, built to display the reconstructed ship and its artefacts. The Mary Rose was one of the largest ships in the English navy through more than three decades of intermittent war and was one of the earliest examples of a sailing warship. She was armed with new types of guns that could fire through the recently invented gun-ports. After being substantially rebuilt in 1536, she was one of the earliest ships that could fire a broadside. Several theories have sought to explain the demise of the Mary Rose, based on records, knowledge of 16th-century shipbuilding. The precise cause of her sinking is unclear, because of conflicting testimonies. In the late 15th century, England was a relatively insignificant state on the periphery of Europe. The great victories against France in the Hundred Years War were in the past, the War of the Roses—the civil war between the houses of York and Lancaster—had ended with Henry VIIs establishment of the House of Tudor, the new ruling dynasty of England. The ambitious naval policies of Henry V were not continued by his successors, the marriage alliance between Anne of Brittany and Charles VIII of France in 1491, and his successor Louis XII in 1499, left England with a weakened strategic position on its southern flank. Despite this, Henry VII managed to maintain a long period of peace. At the onset of the modern period, the great European powers were France. All three became involved in the War of the League of Cambrai in 1508, the conflict was initially aimed at the Republic of Venice but eventually turned against France
9.
Saint George's Cross
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Saint Georges Cross, also called Cross of Saint George, is a red cross on a white background. Sometimes associated with Saint George, the saint, often depicted as a crusader from the late Middle Ages, the cross has appeared on many flags, emblems, standards. Its first documented use was as the ensign of the Republic of Genoa, the cross is also found, for various reasons, on the provincial flags of Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel and Barcelona. In Northern Ireland the cross appears on the flag of the loyalist paramilitary group the Ulster Volunteer Force, Saint George became widely venerated as a warrior saint during the Third Crusade. There was a legend that he had miraculously assisted Godfrey of Bouillon, however, there was no association of the red cross with St George before the end of the crusades. The red-on-white combination was chosen by Genoa and Aragon, among others, Saint George was depicted as a crusader knight during this time, but the red cross had no particular association with him. A crusader-era fresco in the crypt of Trani cathedral shows Saint George wearing a cross on a red surcoat. It continued to be used as the Reichssturmfahne of the Holy Roman Empire, eventually giving rise to the flag of Savoy and the present-day flags of Switzerland and Denmark). The association with the Saint of the red-on-white cross probably arises in Genoa, a vexillum beati Georgii is mentioned in the Genovese annals for the year 1198, referring to a red flag with a depiction of St George and the dragon. An illumination of this flag is shown in the annals for the year 1227, the Genoese flag with the red cross was used alongside this Georges flag, from at least 1218, and was known as the insignia cruxata comunis Janue. The flag showing the saint himself was the principal war flag. The cross ceased to be a symbol associated with the taking of the cross. With the development of heraldry, there was great demand for variations of the cross symbol. Juliana Berners reports that there were Crossis innumerabull born dayli, the term St Georges cross was at first associated with any plain Greek cross touching the edges of the field. Thomas Fuller in 1647 spoke of the plain or St Georges cross as the mother of all the others. Edward III of England chose Saint George as the saint of his Order of the Garter in 1348. There was a tradition claiming that Richard the Lionheart himself adopted both the flag and the patron saint from Genoa at some point during his crusade. This idea can be traced to the Victorian era, Perrin refers to it as a common belief, the English Monarch paid an annual tribute to the Doge of Genoa for this privilege
10.
House of Tudor
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The House of Tudor was a royal house of Welsh and English origin, descended in the male line from the Tudors of Penmynydd. Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including their ancestral Wales, the Tudors succeeded the House of Plantaganet as rulers of the Kingdom of England, and were succeeded by the House of Stuart. The first monarch, Henry VII, descended through his mother from a branch of the English royal House of Lancaster. The Tudor family rose to power in the wake of the Wars of the Roses and his victory was reinforced by his marriage to Elizabeth of York, daughter of King Edward IV, symbolically uniting the former warring factions under a new dynasty. They also maintained the nominal English claim to the Kingdom of France, although none of them made substance of it, after him, his daughter Mary I lost control of all territory in France permanently with the fall of Calais in 1558. In total, five Tudor monarchs ruled their domains for just over a century, Henry VIII was the only male-line male heir of Henry VII to live to the age of maturity. Issues around the royal succession became major political themes during the Tudor era, the House of Stuart, descended from Henry VIIIs sister Margaret, came to power in 1603 when the direct Tudor line failed, as Elizabeth I died without a legitimate heir. The church retroactively declared the Beauforts legitimate by way of a bull the same year. A subsequent proclamation by John of Gaunts legitimate son, Henry IV, also recognised the Beauforts legitimacy, nevertheless, the Beauforts remained closely allied with Gaunts legitimate descendants from his first marriage, the House of Lancaster. On 1 November 1455, John Beauforts granddaughter, Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, married Henry VIs half-brother Edmund Tudor and it was his father, Owen Tudor, who abandoned the Welsh patronymic naming practice and adopted a fixed surname. When he did, he did not choose, as was generally the custom, his fathers name, Maredudd, Owen Tudor was one of the bodyguards for the queen dowager Catherine of Valois, whose husband, Henry V, had died in 1422. Evidence suggests that the two were married in 1429. The two sons born of the marriage, Edmund and Jasper, were among the most loyal supporters of the House of Lancaster in its struggle against the House of York, Edmund died on 3 November 1456. On 28 January 1457, his widow Margaret Beaufort, who had just attained her fourteenth birthday, gave birth to a son, Henry Tudor, at her brother-in-laws Pembroke Castle. Henry Tudor, the future Henry VII, spent his childhood at Raglan Castle, the home of William Herbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke, a leading Yorkist. Following the murder of Henry VI and death of his son, Edward, in 1471, concerned for his young nephews life, Jasper Tudor took Henry to Brittany for safety. Lady Margaret remained in England and remarried, living quietly while advancing the Lancastrian cause, capitalizing on the growing unpopularity of Richard III, she was able to forge an alliance with discontented Yorkists in support of her son. Two years after Richard III was crowned, Henry and Jasper sailed from the mouth of the Seine to the Milford Haven Waterway, upon this victory, Henry Tudor proclaimed himself King Henry VII
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One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Swinburne, H Lawrence (1911). "Flag". In Chisholm, Hugh. Encyclopædia Britannica. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 459.
