Jewel of Muscat

There are two types of steering devices on the Jewel of Muscat – a median rudder controlled by aft-pointing tiller and ropes, and quarter rudders. Since the Belitung wreck did not give an indication as to the steering device/s used, we chose both because the time the Belitung ship sailed was when the transition from quarter rudders to median rudder was happening. Iconography from slightly later shows both systems in use on single vessels (the same thing is demonstrated in European iconography). In addition, we just wanted to experiment with which system would work better.