After nine centuries, this ancient sail is still in use
The word lateen comes from the Italian and Spanish vela latina, the Latin sail. The rig is the forerunner of the gaff rig, which, in turn, gave way to the ubiquitous Bermuda rig on pleasure sailboats. One of the most successful small American sailboat classes of all time, the 13-foot, 10-inch (4.2 m) Sunfish, has a single 75-square-foot (7 m2) lateen sail, but the rig is now mostly confined to the working vessels of the Nile River, the Red Sea, and the dhows of the Indian Ocean.The lateen sail is shaped like a right-angled isosceles triangle and has a long spar attached to its head. The spar is slung at an angle from a stumpy mast, and a single sheet from the clew can trim the sail. It is believed that the ancient Arabs invented the rig and, with the possible exception of the Chinese junk rig, it is the oldest still in use. It came into general use in the eastern Mediterranean in the twelfth century, reaching Western Europe in the fifteenth century. The lateen was one of the first rigs that allowed a vessel to sail efficiently against the wind, and all three of Columbus’s ships carried lateen sails on their mizzenmasts.
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