This account from Homer's Odyssey (circa eighthseventh centuries B.C.E.) is one of the best literary descriptions from antiquity of the "shell-first" shipbuilding construction method. In this story the goddess Kalypso, who has been detaining the hero Odysseus on her island for seven years, is ordered by the other gods to let him go and find his way: home. She reluctantly complies and furnishes him with the tools and materials he needs to build himself a simple ocean-going vessel. Although Odysseus was a man of many talents, it is unlikely that a nonprofessional could accomplish the boat-building job he does here. Shell-first construction was a job for a master carpenter: the planks of the hull had to be joined so tightly and closely that when they swelled upon contact with the water they formed a watertight seal. The ancients...