the brendan voyage dvd

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Segments in this Video

Brendan voyage: prelude (02:54).

Author Tim Severin introduces the story of St. Brendan the Navigator. Severin will undertake the same Atlantic voyage in the same type of boat Brendan would have used.

In Pursuit of a Legend (03:36)

On a small leather boat, five men risk cold, discomfort, and their lives to pursue the legend of St. Brendan, a monk who set sail from Ireland and landed in Newfoundland. Oak and grease prepare the leather; wood and mast are of Irish oak and ash.

Replica Medieval Boat Project (04:04)

Explorer Tim Severin studies Irish navigation to learn how to make a leather boat. He and his crew build a boat and use the same technology just like St. Brendan would have used 1400 years ago.

Transatlantic Journey Begins (04:44)

The replica of a medieval boat sets sail from the same Irish port as St. Brendan did in the 6th century. Seven days out, the small boat meets gale force winds. One man is injured and the water stores are ruined by seawater.

Small Boat, Cramped Space (03:38)

On board the small boat, a replica of a medieval one, the men face the challenges of small ,cramped spaces, lack of dry clothing and sleeping bags, and lack of physical exercise. The crew visits Iona off the coast of Scotland.

From Iona to the Faroes (03:25)

From Iona, the leather boat, a replica of St. Brendan's boat, heads north to the Faroes, famous for its seabirds and sheep. The modern day crew learns to kill seabirds for food.

From the Faroes to Iceland (04:09)

Explorer Severin and his crew of four leave the Faroes and set sail for Iceland. It took St. Brendan 9 days to make the journey. Severin and his boat are welcomed and the boat given a complete inspection.

From Iceland to Greenland (02:54)

Four men leave Iceland on "Brendan," a replica of a medieval boat. They head for Greenland on the most treacherous leg of their journey. This would test the ability of the men and the boat to survive. Whales accompany them along the way.

Dangers on the Sea (04:04)

Out of the protective sphere of Iceland's Coast Guard, the small boat, a replica of a medieval boat, meets gale force winds. Two rogue waves threaten to sink the small boat.

Fog Banks (04:07)

The storm pushes "Brendan," a small boat with 4 men aboard out of radio communication range. Whales continue to accompany the crew. They near Greenland and encounter food, winds, and high seas.

Labrador Pack Ice (05:09)

The crew of the "Brendan" nears Labrador pack ice, what they had hoped to steer clear of. The boat must navigate among large and small ice floes. The hull sustains a hole from a submerged iceberg.

Newfoundland in Sight (03:37)

Leaving the ice floes behind, explorer Severin and his crew and small boat make contact with Newfoundland. They rendezvous with a Coast Guard ship.

End of a 4000-Mile Journey (03:24)

A small boat, a replica of a medieval boat sailed by an Irish monk, takes two Coast Guard officers on board for a small celebration. The little boat is in sight of her goal in North America. The "Brendan" is nearing the end of her 4000-mile journey.

First Explorers to Reach North America (04:39)

In 1977, the leather boat "Brendan" reaches the New World just as the Irish monk St. Brendan had 1400 years before. Perhaps the legend of St. Brendan is no legend at all, but the truth about the first explorers to reach North America.

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The Brendan Voyage

Description.

A popular medieval epic tells of the exploits of the Irish monk Brendan, who in the 6th century—a thousand years before Columbus—sailed in a leather boat across the Atlantic and landed in Newfoundland. In a reenactment of the actual voyage, the crew of this program set off from the West of Ireland, follow the "Stepping Stone Route" (Hebrides, Faroes, Iceland, and along the coast of Greenland), and fight gales and ice floes, only to survive and prove yet again that epic and legend are, more often than not, rooted in fact. (54 minutes)

Length: 57 minutes

Item#: BVL4291

Copyright date: © 1992

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Tim Severin

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You could say that Tim Severin is a historical re-enactor, but that would conjure all the wrong images, of renaissance fairs and Colonial Williamsburg. At nearly 80 years old, his accomplishments are better described as experiential archaeology , recreating legendary journeys to prove they could have happened. His historical adventures are based on years of upfront study, working with scholars to decipher ancient texts and find period-appropriate technology and materials. I only recently learned about Severin’s work, through his 1978 book that documents a fascinating early project called The Brendan Voyage .

In the 6th-century, an Irish monk named St. Brendan wrote the Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis (The Voyage of St. Brendan the Abbot), a document describing a westward sea journey to the “promised land” that some believe was North America. The journey included numerous stops at islands along the way, and he described seeing fantastic sights and creatures from aboard his medieval “skin boat.” Although some scholars interpret the monk’s manuscript figuratively, others subscribe to the belief that it is more travelogue than fable. That question is at the heart of The Brendan Voyage , Severin’s project to recreate St. Brendan’s journey and prove that a leather-clad sailboat could successfully traverse the North Atlantic.

“Of course, if the claim was true, then Saint Brendan would have reached America almost a thousand years before Columbus and four hundred years before the Vikings.” The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin, Chapter 1

Severin’s first task, which took years of hard work, was the creation of a boat that would match the one used by St. Brendan. In The Brendan Voyage he describes a process of researching, learning, and collaborating with various experts. The energy surrounding the project is contagious, and propelled by what he calls “Brendan Luck” that seems to grace him throughout the project.

The traditional Irish curragh , which is still in use today on the west coast of Ireland, is a descendent of the boat that St. Brendan would have sailed. In modern times, canvas is stretched over the wooden frame, but the Navigatio describes a boat covered with oxhide. This was the first materials challenge for Severin, and initial tests showed that leather would deteriorate quickly in sea water.

Luckily the text provides additional clues, describing the leather as “tanned in oak bark” and coated in “grease” to make it water proof. After numerous lab studies it was proven that, indeed, oak bark was the best leather treatment. Severin found a single tannery in Britain that could help, run by the Croggon family in the Cornish town of Grampound. They had been using traditional tanning techniques since they opened in 1711, and as Brendan Luck would have it, they were enthusiastic about the project.

“So began a delightful period of work. The British leather industry took the Brendan project to heart, and what splendid people the leathermakers turned out to be.” The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin, Chapter 2

The manuscript describes applying “grease” to the leather, and even mentions bringing extra grease on the journey for re-application. These kinds of details further convinced Severin that he was reading the documentation of a real trip. It’s easy to determine that this must have been lanolin or “wool grease,” a wax that secreted by sheep. Severin and his crew applied it liberally to the oak bark leather and described the resulting stench as nearly unbearable.

“I wonder if you could supply me with some wool grease.” “Yes, of course. How much do you want?” “About three-quarters of a ton, please.” There was stunned silence. The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin, Chapter 2

The remaining challenges of building Brenden , a 36-foot medieval boat were numerous and back breaking. Just the right cuts of oak and ash were found to build the mast and hull—apparently the north side of the tree is the strongest. Joints were lashed together with miles of leather stripping, and 49 overlapping ox hides were stitched together with flax cords. Brendan Luck struck again when Severin learned that John O’Connell, a master harness maker, lived nearby where the boat was being built. He joined the project and taught Severin and a team of volunteers how to stitch the thick leather. Once on the ocean their lives would depend on the quality of every stitch and knot, a reality that hung heavy over the slow and strenuous work.

For more detail on the boat’s construction I suggest checking out the article Across the Atlantic in a Leather Boat , which includes relevant excepts from the book and broader information on traditional skin boats in other parts of the world.

The Journey

On May 17, 1976 Brenden set sail from Brandon Creek (named after an alternate spelling of the monk’s name) in County Kerry, Ireland. Every step of the voyage is detailed wonderfully in the book, including photographs from aboard the boat. Even though I knew they would make it, the vivid description of life aboard the boat was both nail biting and riveting.

The route, as with the boat’s construction, was an attempt to recreate the original journey as much as possible. Brendan followed a “stepping stone” path along the western coast of Ireland, and into the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. The first long stretch at sea was from Stornoway to the Faroe Islands, and in-between the crew was delighted by continual visits from pods of curious whales.

The Faroes are a potential match for two of the islands mentioned in the Navigatio : “The Island of Sheep” and “The Paradise of Birds.” As they approached the islands from the west, a storm in the Mykines Sound nearly forced Brendan to sail onward without landing, but they managed to maneuver north around Streymoy and land safely in the harbor at Tjørnuvík.

“More than any other people I had ever met, the Faroese understood the sea and showed their appreciation of the endeavor, and once again it was easy to detect the common bond which linked all seafarers in those hostile, northern waters.” The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin, Chapter 7

Throughout the journey, there were a few points where it became necessary for crew members to leave the project, because of injury or circumstance, and thus new people were needed to join. On the Faroe Islands, Brendan Luck would have it, that Tim Severin met Tróndur Patterson.

Today, Tróndur Patterson is a well known artist in the Faroe Islands. He’s celebrated for his paintings, sculptures, and glass art that are inspired by life at sea. Severin described meeting Tróndur as an almost fateful occurrence, beginning with an invitation to his home in Kirkjubøur where he realized that the village had a historical place name related to St. Brendan.

“What is the name of the village?” I asked. “Kirkjubo,” she replied. “Does it have any other name?” “Yes, sometimes this place is called Brandarsvik.” The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin, Chapter 7

Tróndur was quieter than the other crew members, but he brought a Faroese confidence to life at sea. He was adept at catching seabirds using whale blubber, and had tricks for staying warm in soaking wet clothes. He also had a sixth sense for a how to respond in stormy weather, which proved invaluable during the latter half of the trip. His spare time at sea was spent drawing, and the book is filled with his illustrations.

Not only was Patursson a vital crew member on Brendan , the fateful meeting kicked off a longer collaboration with Severin. Just two years after The Brendan Voyage was complete they were reunited aboard another ancient vessel to attempt The Sindbad Voyage .

From the Faroe Islands the crew sailed to Iceland, which St. Brendan called the “Island of Smiths” in an apparent description of a volcanic eruption. After bringing the boat ashore in Reykjavík, it was clear that Brendan had fared well. The leather hull was coated in barnacles, but without a single tear or hole. Still, after weeks of waiting for favorable weather, it was determined that the sea between Iceland and Greenland was simply too rough to continue; sailing season was over. They decided to wait until the following spring and docked Brendan in Iceland for the winter.

It had always been a good guess that the last leg of the trip would be the hardest, since the waters around Greenland and Labrador are sparsely inhabited and treacherous. That turned out to be true for Brendan , which nearly capsized in stormy weather and suffered damage to her leather hull while navigating through icebergs. It was touch and go at times, but of course, in the end, they were successful. On June 26, 1977 the voyage was completed by landing on Peckford Island, Newfoundland. In the documentary , which includes film from land-based crews as well as onboard footage, we see excited crowds awaiting the boat’s arrival and an impromptu parade celebrating the sailors’ accomplishment.

A successful voyage of course doesn’t prove that Irish monks came to North America a thousand years before Columbus, but it does show that they could have using the technology available to them. I find The Brendan Voyage fascinating for both its historical significance and the way it transpires across so many of my favorite islands. I’m also impressed by how well documented it was, the detail of the book and accompanying film. I’m surprised I hadn’t heard about this adventure before, given that it concluded a full year before I was born. I guess I should consider it Brendan Luck that it finally crossed my path.

I’d suggest getting a physical copy of the The Brendan Voyage book , perhaps seeking out the original 1978 hardcover to ensure it has all of the photographs, maps, and illustrations by Tróndur Patursson.

Whether you read it or not, I highly recommend watching the documentary, which is available on YouTube in two parts and is just under an hour in total.

Finally, you might be interested in this Story Map about The Brendan Voyage , which includes accurate Google Maps showing the route across the North Atlantic.

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Tim Severin's The Brendan Voyage

While cataloguing the Irish Folklife currach collection, I am always conscious that the boats I am working on are as far from their natural environment as they could possibly be. While most of them once worked the inshore fishing spots of the Irish west coast and rested out in the open when not in use, they are now safely stored indoors in environmentally controlled conditions that will ensure their preservation. As a result of their being stored indoors, both prior to and after the National Museum of Ireland acquired them, the skins of some of our boats have dried out and become hard and inflexible. Except for those who have taken to the water in a currach over a lengthy period, it is difficult to appreciate how their simple design and natural materials will perform when faced with the harsh truths of the sea and the elements. Part of my work on our planned boat gallery at the National Museum of Ireland – Country Life is to talk to fishermen who worked, and still work, with currachs to understand the boat’s capabilities. Unfortunately, pandemic restrictions have prevented me from carrying out fieldwork and interviews but there are sources that provide first-hand accounts of experiencing travel by currach. Tim Severin’s book The Brendan Voyage is one of those sources.

Tim Severin (1940-2020). Photograph from www.timseverin.net.

Tim Severin was an explorer, author and historian who sadly passed away last month at the age of 80. Throughout 1976-1977, Severin led a small group of fellow explorers as they sailed the journey from Ireland west across the Atlantic Ocean to the Promised Land believed to have been completed by Saint Brendan in the sixth century. Saint Brendan had made the journey in a large currach made of a wooden frame and covered with tanned oxhides. Severin’s aim was to see whether Saint Brendan’s journey had been possible and to do that the group’s vessel would have to be as close a replica of the saint’s boat as possible which also meant using materials and building methods from that time.

The Brendan currach under construction in Crosshaven Boatyard showing its primitive wooden skeleton and hide skin. Photograph by Ian Yeomans.

The finished 36 foot boat, named Brendan, had a double gunwale of oak. Leather thongs were used to lash the ash frame together and the outside of the hull was then covered with 49 quarter of an inch thick oxhides that were stitched together and finished with a wool grease coating. Brendan’s two masts and oars were also made from ash and flax made suitable sails and ropes.

The Brendan currach. Photograph by Cotton Coulson.

The impressive construction of the boat was informed by thorough research, but how would she handle on the open waters of the rough Atlantic? Here, The Brendan Voyage gives us many practical and poetic descriptions of Brendan’s capabilities. Severin describes how Brendan’s light frame meant the boat could mould to the many waves that pounded its shell. The flexibility offered by the leather skin developed in Severin ‘a sense of being part of the sea’s motion’. He believed the leather survived so well in part due to the cold waters of the Atlantic.

The sides of the boat pumped gently in and out as though the Brendan were breathing

When Brendan was holed by drifting ice in the dangerous stretch between Greenland and Newfoundland, crew member George Molony had the unpleasant job of hanging over the gunwale in water temperatures as low as zero degrees centigrade in order to patch and stitch the hull while the boat kept sailing. Up to that point, ice had been glancing rather harmlessly off the curved hull of the currach.

Patches on the canvas skin of a National Museum of Ireland currach from Inis Oírr. © National Museum of Ireland.

The combination of Brendan’s medieval design and natural materials made it an extremely durable boat. Even during sea trials in advance of launching from Ireland, deliberate attempts to capsize Brendan were extraordinarily difficult. The currach could also be fast, when conditions were right. Brendan’s best 24-hour distance was an impressive 115 miles. Brendan reached her destination in June 1977. The large currach’s epic journey had proven that, in Tim Severin’s own words, ‘she was a true ocean-going vessel, and there was no longer any practical objection to the idea that Irish monks might have sailed their leather boats to North America before the Norsemen, and long before Columbus.’

My thanks to Afloat.ie for assistance in sourcing images.

Severin, Tim, The Brendan Voyage , London: Arrow Books Ltd., 1979.

Comments about this page

Hello Bill. The Brendan boat is on public display at Craggaunowen Castle in Co. Clare.

I just finished reading the Modern Library Exploration Edition of The Brendan Voyage and was amazed at the determination of the Crew through the entire process. I did wonder if the Brendan went to a museum after her adventure? It would have been a task to keep her in seaworthy condition, but as an old Sailor I hope she is still around. Great book overall.

Had the honor to meet Tim Severin onboard NatGeo’s Explorer May 2019 when he was a guest lecturer. He was engaging and his explorations so interesting. His contribution appreciated.

He will be missed by all.

Reading this brought back childhood memories of when the Brendan had to make an unscheduled stop at Ballywhoriskey along the Fanad coastline. I just submitted my words on it.

Thanks for your brief synopsis, it is a fascinating story. Mr Severin was a very brave man obviously a driven man but he must have done his research to a great extent to gather confidence for the journey. I love the sea but the thoughts of that challenge that they did with great success was truely remarkable. So proud of my name and of Mr. Severin. What a man!

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The brendan voyage by tim severin.

The Brendan Voyage is the real life adventure story of a man who tried to recreate a Medieval legend: sailing across the North Atlantic from Ireland to America in a small leather boat.

The Brendan Voyage: Sailing to America in a Leather Boat to Prove the Legend of the Irish Sailor Saints by Tim Severin. Modern Library, 2000 (first published 1978).

Reading Level: Adult, ages 16 and up

Recommended For : Ages 12 and up

When I was in school, we learned that “Columbus discovered America.” But most scholars now are pretty sure Vikings reached the Americas before Columbus… and some of the Irish.

The Brendan Voyage is about one man’s attempt to prove the possibility that St. Brendan, a Medieval Irish monk, traveled to North America in a small leather boat. After all, if it’s possible, then the legends may be based on fact. Tim Severin researched Medieval boat construction, tracked down obscure practitioners of such traditional crafts as oak-tanning leather, and gathered a crew of laborers and sailors. Months of preparation led up to the planned launch date (on St. Brendan’s day, naturally). His crew of 5 were as prepared as they could be when they set sail in a tiny leather boat. Their route: to follow the North Atlantic “stepping stone” route up past Ireland, to the Hebrides, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland, and eventually Canada. If you know your geography, this sounds like a doable–but very cold and dangerous–route, even in modern ocean-going vessels. Would it work in a small leather boat?

Part history, part geography, part natural history, part adventure story, The Brendan Voyage grabs readers from page one. Severin mixes in fascinating historical details as he describes his process from the birth of his crazy idea to its fulfillment. Along the way, he includes much information about early Medieval Christianity. Severin is respectful of the monks’ religion and goes to great lengths to demonstrate that their accounts of sea monsters, men on fire, and other wildly improbable happenings could have actually happened . Rather than disproving the monks’ veracity, he adds credibility to their stories.

Danger on the high seas, literary legends, interesting boat construction–this is a book that should particularly appeal to guys. Girls will enjoy it, too, but men risking danger and building stuff… and then sailing off with a crew of men… Well, it begs for a high school boy audience.

Considerations:

• Language: there is a small amount of profanity in this book, usually during times of great danger/stress.
• Some editions include great photographs that may not translate well in the kindle/digital editions.
• If your kids read this book, it’s worth asking them about the “Brendan luck.” What does Severin mean? Is there another explanation? What would the Medieval monks have said?

Overall Rating: 4.5/5

• Worldview/Moral Rating: 4.25
• Literary Rating: 4.75

Recommended Reading from Redeemed Reader:

• A Book Review: Unbroken . Another true story on the high seas.
• A Book Review: The Boys in the Boat (another great story about boats!)
• A Book List : Learning to Lead (full of epic true stories)

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Tim Severin: Writer and explorer best known for the Brendan Voyage

Remarkable adventure saga became international best seller and documentary film.

Tim Severin with sextant as the leather vessel the Brendan crossed from Ireland to North America.

Tim Severin

Born: September 25th, 1940

Died: December 18th, 2020

The explorer, writer and film maker, Tim Severin, best known for the Brendan Voyage where he sailed from Ireland to Newfoundland to prove that the 6th century Irish saint could have reached the Americas 900 years before Columbus, has died at his home in west Cork at the age of 80.

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Severin was born in Assam in India, the son of an English tea planter, but he was keen to dispel any notions of privilege when he spoke to The Irish Times in 1999. “We were very poor. The tea planters were not rich. The people who owned the plantations were rich but they were back in Scotland and England. My parents were poor.”

He was sent to boarding school in England at the age of seven and he later read history and geography at Oxford, and it was while he was still an undergraduate there at Keble College in 1961 that he sought to recreate his first ancient journey, retracing on motorbike Marco Polo’s 13th-century journey into Asia.

Six years later he followed in the footsteps of Spanish conquistadors and others sailing down the Mississippi river, but it was his decision to try to follow in the footsteps of St Brendan and cross the Atlantic in a leather-bound boat in 1976 that caught the public imagination.

Studying the Latin texts of the Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis (The Voyage of St Brendan the Abbot) which dates back to at least 800 AD and tells the story of Brendan’s (circa 489-583), Severin sought to follow in the Irish saint’s steps.

“I recreated the boat of St Brendan and set out to see what would happen, and it was in that way that I discovered for me, the fascination of travel wasn’t just space but being able to go back in time, and . . . that new dimension opened for me on the Atlantic,” he later said.

Severin set about building as close a replica of St Brendan’s boat as possible, sourcing oak and ash from Glennan Brothers in Longford and tanned leather from 25 oxen from a firm called Josiah Crogan in Cornwall. He consulted harnessmaker John O’Connell from Bishopstown in Cork. Eleven metres long and open, St Brendan, built at Crosshaven Boatyard in Co Cork, was made from ash ribs and oak dunnels, lashed together with nearly 3km of leather thongs in 1,600 knots, wrapped with 49 traditionally tanned ox hides and sealed with wool grease to protect against the salt water.

As he surveyed the stitching of the leather hides on to the boat at Crossshaven Boatyard, Severin told RTÉ News: “I think the boat is as safe as the people sailing her – the question is ‘Can we sail her well enough?’ And that is the one of the really great questions – in the few months available to us for our trials, can we learn some of the lost arts of handling this type of boat?

“I wouldn’t be doing it unless I was confident that we could manage to do it – we will need weather luck and we do need favourable winds and we could do without any storms.”

On May 17th, 1976, Severin and his three fellow crew men, led by sailing master George Moloney from Dublin, rowed out of Brandon Creek on the Dingle Peninsula, the spot where St Brendan is reported to have departed almost 1,500 years earlier to begin what would prove a 7,200km epic journey.

Severin later explained in a documentary film he made about the voyage: “It was the first of my major projects, and it was to test whether the story of St Brendan, which was hugely well-known during the later Middle Ages, could have been true.

“The story was called the Navigation . . . about the voyage of St Brendan, who sets out with a party of monks in a boat made of leather, and has various adventures on the way, stops at various islands, and reaches a great land far in the West. Some people of course have said he reached North America.

“When I say that it was very well known, it was well known to the extent that Columbus, when he was half way across, actually stopped his little flotilla of three vessels and said, ‘This is about the area where we should find the islands which St Brendan visited.’ Columbus believed in the story and the islands were marked on the map.”

Severin and his crew sailed to the Aran Islands and from there to Iona, the Hebrides, the Faroe Islands (where they picked up artist, Trondur Patersson), before sailing on to Iceland and Greenland and from Greenland to Newfoundland.

He believed his recreation of the voyage helped to identify the bases for many of the legendary elements of the St Brendan story: the Island of Sheep, the Paradise of Birds, Crystal Towers, mountains that hurled rocks at voyagers, and the Promised Land.

On June 26th, 1977, some 13 months after leaving Brandon Creek, Severin and his crew sailed into Musgrave Harbour on Peckford Island in Newfoundland and were welcomed as heroes by the locals who fully appreciated the navigational feat.

But crew member Arthur Mangan from Howth related just how dangerous the voyage was aboard the open boat when he spoke to RTÉ News the day after they landed safely at Musgrove Harbour following the final stage of the voyage – a 52 day trip from Greenland.

“We had some pretty hairy times out there . . . off the east of Greenland, we had a storm of Force 11 or 12 with 40ft waves folding in on us in the boot – at one stage I was up to my knees in water – the boat was half full of water and we just had to get that water out as fast as possible.”

Severin published the story of his remarkable adventure in The Brendan Voyage, a book which became an international best seller that was translated into 16 languages. He also made a documentary film about the voyage.

“It was a project which completely changed my life . . . Because of Brendan, I was able to do a number of other projects of similar kind, mainly investigating legendary voyages by building a ship of the time and sailing,” he told the Irish Examiner in 2017.

Severin undertook voyages to retrace the journey of Sinbad the Sailor from The One Thousand and One Nights in 1980 and 1981, and the voyages of legendary figures from Greek mythology such as Jason and the Argonauts in 1984 and Ulysses in 1985.

He followed the knights of the First Crusade by riding on horseback to Jerusalem in 1987 and 1988. He rode with Mongol horsemen in 1990 to mark the 800th anniversary of the birth of Genghis Khan. That story was published in 1993 as The Search for Genghis Khan.

A prolific author, Severin also wrote a series of historical novels, The Vikings Series about a young Viking adventurer, Thorgils Leiffson who leaves the frozen shores of Greenland and sails as far as Byzantium .

In addition, Severin wrote a series of novels about fictional 17th-century pirate, Hector Lynch, before turning his hand to a series of historical novels set in Anglo-Saxon England. He returned to Hector Lynch in his most recent work of fiction, Freebooter, which was published in 2017.

Severin, who died at his home in Timoleague in west Cork, is survived by his wife, Dee and daughter, Ida as well as his son-in-law James Ashworth and grandsons, George and Guy.

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Book Review: The Brendan Voyage

Posted by Ann Hoffner | Book Reviews , Dogwatch , Reviews

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The book, a remarkable tale of twentieth century survival at sea, is the work of a man who billed himself an explorer/traveler and earned degrees in history and geography at Oxford during which he traced Marco Polo’s caravan route on a motorcycle. He made a life of recreating and then writing/filming historical explorations.

Saint Brendan the Navigator’s original voyage is told in the Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis, a Latin text written somewhat after the fact that has been the subject of much speculation. Severin, along with his wife, a medieval scholar, thought the trip could have been possible and wanted to prove it. In his book he recounts the years spent acquiring materials (including 49 oxhides which had to be stitched together with flax) and details of boat design based on the traditional curraghs of the West Irish coast, which are still in use.

If Severin’s book were simply his descriptions of building the Brendan and recreating Saint Brendan’s voyage, I would not be writing this review. Instead, The Brendan Voyage is one of the more swashbuckling sea stories I’ve read, describing in vivid language gales along the North Atlantic “stepping-stone” route through the islands off Ireland and Scotland, Iceland, and Greenland to the coast of Newfoundland, a route Severin notes sailing yachts stay away from. Life on the 36-foot Brendan is degrees harder than anything most modern sailors encounter on the ocean. The longest stretch encountered by the four-person crew, fifty days, took them into the ice pack west of Greenland where there was a real risk of losing the boat and their lives, even though they had a life raft, the conditions being so extreme. As part of his proof that Saint Brendan could have done the trip, Severin points to several periods of climate warming in the medieval ages when there would have been little or no sea ice.

The reader develops a visceral sense of the open leather boat which had a sea motion “more like a life raft than a conventional vessel. She heaved and swayed, then bobbed, swayed and heaved…” Brendan was covered more or less successfully with tarps, and her sides were low enough that the crew were almost eyelevel with the whales that visited on many occasions.

Whether indeed Saint Brendan and his Irish monks made the voyage, Severin and the Brendan’s safe arrival in Canada shows that a leather boat could. For me it was an interesting revelation that Irish people explored far and wide on the northern seas, like the Polynesian navigators in the Pacific helping to expand the world long before the Vikings and the Europeans and showing my own ancestors to be great explorers.

The Brendan Voyage: Sailing to America in a Leather Boat to Prove the Legend of the Irish Sailor Saints , by Tim Severin (Modern Library, 2000)

About The Author

Ann Hoffner

Ann Hoffner and her husband, photographer Tom Bailey, spent 10 years cruising on their Peterson 44, Oddly Enough. They sold the boat in Borneo, returned to the US, and bought a Cape Dory 25 in Maine. Ann is a long-time contributor to sailing magazines, most often writing about weather events on passage and places she's been.

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• Cast & crew

The Brendan Voyage

• Episode aired Jul 21, 1985

A five man crew braves the North Atlantic Ocean in an effort to recreate the legendary voyage of Saint Brendan. A five man crew braves the North Atlantic Ocean in an effort to recreate the legendary voyage of Saint Brendan. A five man crew braves the North Atlantic Ocean in an effort to recreate the legendary voyage of Saint Brendan.

• Timothy Severin
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• July 21, 1985 (United States)
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The Brendan voyage

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The Brendan Voyage Hardcover – January 1, 1978

• Book 1 of 6 Voyage
• Language English
• Publisher McGr aw-Hill Book Co.
• Publication date January 1, 1978
• ISBN-10 0340239514
• ISBN-13 978-0340239513
• See all details

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Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ McGr aw-Hill Book Co.; First Edition (January 1, 1978)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0340239514
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0340239513
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.1 pounds
• #2,210 in Ship History (Books)
• #3,095 in Expeditions & Discoveries World History (Books)

About the author

Tim severin.

TIM SEVERIN has made a career of retracing the storied journeys of mythical and historical figures. He has sailed a leather boat across the Atlantic in the wake of the Irish monk Saint Brendan, captained an Arab sailing ship from Muscat to China, steered the replica of a Bronze Age galley to seek the landfalls of Jason and the Argonauts and Ulysses, ridden the route of the First Crusade from a castle in Belgium to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, travelled on horseback with the nomads of Mongolia to explore the heritage of Genghis Khan, sailed the Pacific on a bamboo raft to test the theory that ancient Chinese mariners could have travelled to the Americas, retraced the journeys of Alfred Russel Wallace, Victorian pioneer naturalist, through the Spice Islands of Indonesia aboard a native sailing vessel, identified the facts behind the story of Moby Dick the fighting white whale among the native peoples of the Pacific islands, and discovered the origins of the ‘real’ Robinson Crusoe in the adventures of a castaway stranded 300 years ago on a desert island off the coast of Venezuela.

As a historical novelist he has written the best-selling VIKING and HECTOR LYNCH trilogies. The Book of Dreams, the first volume of his SAXON trilogy was published in August 2012

His travels have been the subject of award winning documentary films and a major BBC documentary series, and are collected under the title TIME TRAVELLER. They have been screened on Discovery Channel, Sky Television, and National Geographic TV, and he has written regularly about his expeditions in the National Geographic Magazine. He has won the Thomas Cook Travel Book award, The Book of the Sea Award, a Christopher Prize, the Sykes Medal of the Society of Asian Affairs, and the literary Medal of the Academie de Marine. His replica boats have become museum exhibits. In l986 he was awarded the Gold Medal (Founder's Medal) of the Royal Geographical Society for his research into early voyages, and in 1987 the Livingstone Medal of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. In 1996 he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa, by Trinity College, Dublin, and in 2003 received an Honorary Doctorate from the National University of Ireland.

He lives in Co. Cork, Ireland.

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