It's looking superb. Is there any place for someone to beat time for the rowers, or do they not need an external means of keeping time?
Commands were verbal.
The rowing style was called
a scalocio and rather than multiple banks of oars with individual rowers, it was a single
bank of oars with multiple rowers on each one, five on a regular galley, seven on a
Reale flagship.
The most inboard rower was the 'lead rower' for each bench and he controlled their movement, and he in turn followed
the lead of the 'lead rower' in front of him. Four of the lead rowers were classed, and treated, as sailors and were the
'head rowers', two aft and two forward. The two aft head rowers, from the benches closest to the poop, were called
espaliers because of their proximity to the espale, the galley embarkation points near the poop. The espaliers
set the stroke for the whole ship.
The two forward head rowers were the
connillers, who also had responsibility for positioning the anchors.
So basically when a command was given to slow down, speed up etc., it was directed at the espaliers and all the other
lead rowers duplicated their action.
From the same book,
The Age of the Galley, which includes a detailed analysis from the engineering and ergonomic
stand points, which concludes that the majority of the rowers effort went into simply maneuvering the oar and their own
bodies, with the result that only a small percentage of their energy expenditure was actually translated into forward motion.
