Insights
A1 wasn't always a boast, it started as a ship survey at Lloyd's coffee house in the 1680s. Discover how two characters became shorthand for the best today.
Sailors had a phrase for a rite of passage that killed 10,000 of them, Rounding the Horn. Discover the deadly voyage and what it takes to survive in recruitment.
The sailor's habit of watching the sky before the storm, and why recruiters never really switch it off
Piss boats, switched barrels, or 1700s slang? The three competing origins of "taking the piss", why historians can't agree, and the theory we'd put money on.
Why did sailors take an axe to their own anchor? The maritime origin of "cut and run", and what it teaches us about leaving jobs, and bad hires, behind.
Bear-shirts, bare chests, or a total loss of control? Discover the brutal 1,000-year history behind going "berserk" and how the Norse sagas still argue.
The most successful pirate in history: a woman who commanded 1,800 ships, beat three navies, then negotiated a pardon and retired rich.
Why do we say 'dead as a dodo'? It started as a sailor's insult, fool or fat arse, but the bird wasn't stupid at all. It simply trusted the wrong ships in 1598.
In 1914 a German warship disguised itself as the British liner Carmania, then was sunk by the real Carmania in the first ever battle between two ocean liners.
It was Darren's round, then he was gone. The surprising story behind 'fly by night', from a witch slur, to a debtor, to a sail that flew through the night.
