Queen of the seas for centuries, the trieres or trireme (literally in Greek, "three-oar") was the backbone of most Mediterranean navies prior to the rise of Alexander the Great, and consisted of a warship propelled by three banks of oars, hence its name. Thought to have been first introduced by the Phoenicians of the Middle East, the trireme is often heavily associated with the Athenian Greeks, who under the leadership of Themistokles (524–429BCE) established a fleet of such warships for the Athenian republic, allowing Athens to embark on a journey towards commercial domination and glory.
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| - Queen of the seas for centuries, the trieres or trireme (literally in Greek, "three-oar") was the backbone of most Mediterranean navies prior to the rise of Alexander the Great, and consisted of a warship propelled by three banks of oars, hence its name. Thought to have been first introduced by the Phoenicians of the Middle East, the trireme is often heavily associated with the Athenian Greeks, who under the leadership of Themistokles (524–429BCE) established a fleet of such warships for the Athenian republic, allowing Athens to embark on a journey towards commercial domination and glory.
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| - Queen of the seas for centuries, the trieres or trireme (literally in Greek, "three-oar") was the backbone of most Mediterranean navies prior to the rise of Alexander the Great, and consisted of a warship propelled by three banks of oars, hence its name. Thought to have been first introduced by the Phoenicians of the Middle East, the trireme is often heavily associated with the Athenian Greeks, who under the leadership of Themistokles (524–429BCE) established a fleet of such warships for the Athenian republic, allowing Athens to embark on a journey towards commercial domination and glory. At the height of Athenian power, triremes were as wide as 4 metres, and also had a deck length of roughly around 40 metres, and with sufficient exertion were rather speedy vessels. By the post-Alexandrine era, however, newer and larger vessels as well as economically lean times meant that the trireme would soon fall out of favour with Mediterranean navies who like the Seleucids and Egyptians preferred to build larger vessels, or recruit lighter but cheaper ships such as liburnae and lemboi.
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