1497 Voyage | Age of Exploration | Life on Board | Navigation | About John Cabot

Life on board on the original Matthew

What was life like on board the Matthew?

Cabot had an international crew of about 18 men. They included a Burgundian from France and a ship's doctor from Genoa in Italy. One of Cabot's sons, Sebastian, claimed later that he had sailed on this voyage. If he did he would have been about 13 or 14 years of age, Sebastian is unreliable as a witness though. Research has shown that he sometimes got confused about dates and events.

The Crew

Captain
John Cabot. He was in charge of discipline and deciding the course which the Matthew should take.

Master
The second-in-command. He may have been called Lancelot Thirkill. He was responsible for working the sails and taking navigational readings.

The rest of the crew
The sailors mended sails, rope and leaks in the ship. Working in shifts, their task was to keep the Matthew on the move. They did this by using ropes, pulleys and windlasses to raise, lower and trim the sails.

Food & Clothing

We have no direct evidence of what they ate but we can estimate the likely diet through our knowledge of sixteenth-century ships like the Mary Rose.

The basic diet on a ship like the Matthew was:

• Salted meat
• Salted fish
• Bread - a very hard baked type like a biscuit
• Beer
• Cabot and his officers would have had their own store including live poultry, eggs and wine.

Seamen's clothing was made of coarse, hardwearing material such as canvas, linen and wool. Spare clothing, and the seaman's personal possessions, was kept in his sea chest which also acted as a table or chair.