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θύρη. The framework of the ‘crate’ was of ‘tamarisk wood’, over which a ‘wattle of reeds’ was worked. The object of this was not (as H. says) to catch the current, but to keep the vessel straight as it drifts with the stream; steering is of course impossible with a drifting boat, as boat and stream are moving at the same pace. Chesney (ii. 640) describes an almost exactly similar method of guiding with the skin-boats of the Euphrates (cf. i. 194 nn.).

λίθος τετρημένος: the original form of anchor (cf. Hom. Od. xiii. 77); here by lessening the speed of the boat it made it possible to steer with the πηδάλιον (§ 3).

ἀπίει: i. e. the boatman.

ἐπιφέρεσθαι: i. e. the ‘crate’ is ‘on the surface’, so opposed to the λίθος, which is ἐν βυσσῷ.

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