Using gold and blue paint on 17th century sailing ships

Gold leaf was not only replaced by yellow or ochre, it could be replaced by almost any color appropriate to the carving.  For example, one reference in my collection states that the carvings on Le Soleil Royal were at one point painted white.  Also, the reds and blues found on 17th century ships gave way to black, a much cheaper paint to produce.

Bill

So would gold colour be substituted with yellow or ocre and thus documented as being a gold representation?

The "Royal Sovereign" was a special case.

If you read books like Hornblower you often hear references to the scandal of the decoration on Royal Sovereign. But one must remember that this refers to the Royal Sovereign of King Charles I! That refers to the 17. century as this thread does and not to the later ships of the same name.

The ultramarine colour was as correctly stated very expensive. Later on one got cobalt blue which is just as stable, but lighter in colour and very cheap to make.

Prior to some time before the mid 18th century, warships were as much to impress opponents as to actually fight them.  The ships were very expensive to build and guilding didn't really add that much to cost.  Gold leaf is incredibly thin, and hence not a lot of gold was involved.  Further, the major warships were commanded by quite wealthy men, and the captains frequently subsidized the guilding and decorating.  During the 18th century things changed.  The economy changed, making governments/soverigns more concerned about cost.  Further, there were changes, at least in Britain, in naval administration (the Anson heritage) and naval promotions became more to do with merit than status.  As a result, guilding did seem to be reduced and yellow paint began to replace guilding.  This was not as true in French ships until their revolution.  Don't know about other European ships.  American ships, of course, were on a strict budget, and the lack of fancy decoration was always more in evidence.  Carving, of course, was common whatever the country- apparently wood carvers were common and not well paid.

According to current research on the Wasa, there was no pitch color used below the waterline, either.  It was left its natural wood color.  So, it seems that your acquaintance is at least partially correct about ship colors of the 17th century.  But, I would be sceptical about stretching his points too far.

For example, if you consider the Berain paintings of Le Soleil Royal, the ship was painted mostly in a shade of blue. Since Berain was responsible to Louis XIV for the decor of the King's ships, I would consider him a reliable source.  Consider also that contemporary Dutch sources referred to the British Royal Sovereign as "the golden devil". By all accounts, she was richly guilded in gold painted carvings.  Note also that subsequent British ships were less guilded; Prince was decorated very simply by comparison.  One factor  could be the individual wealth of the ship's captain and precisely how ornate he wanted the ship to appear. 

So, the correct answer seems to be that it depends on the ship and the period in her career that the modeller is modeling.

As an aside . . . I am really looking forward to Revell's release of Wasa later this year!

Bill

Yes, it is this same picture that i am referring to and why i asked the question

Richard

Richard,

We now know that Wasa was actually painted red not blue on the upper part of the hull, and the carvings were not painted solely in gold but were painted in many different colors such as flesh tones, greens, blue, etc.  The lower hull was left bare wood.  There is a wonderful picture of a model of Wasa showing the stern and port quarter on the cover of the Sep/Oct 2010 Ships in Scale.

Bill Morrison

Lapis lazuli is a relatively rare semi-precious stone that has been prized since antiquity for its intense blue color, viz.