Explorer and filmmaker Tim Severin dies aged 80
Tim Severin, explorer, historian and writer, has passed away at the age of 80. Picture: Denis Minihane.
The renowned explorer, author and filmmaker, Tim Severin, has died. He was 80.
Born in India, schooled in England, and a resident of West Cork for several years, Severin retraced the journeys of Saint Brendan the Navigator, Sindbad the Sailor, Jason and the Argonauts, Ulysses, Genghis Khan and Robinson Crusoe over the course of a remarkable career of global adventures.
He made headlines around the world in 1976 when he sailed “The Brendan”, a replica eighth century leather-covered boat across the Atlantic to show St Brendan reached America before Columbus.
He put “The Brendan” through early sea trials in Courtmacsherry Harbour before embarking on his famous voyage from West Kerry. He would go on to settle in Courtmacsherry and later in Timoleague.
He went on to retrace the famous adventures of Sindbad, by sailing a replica ninth-century Arab dhow from Oman, in November 1980, across the Arabian Sea, along the coast of India and on to Guangzhou in China by July the following year - a journey of some 6,000 miles.
In 1984, he and 20 volunteer oarsmen re-traced the voyage of Jason and the Argonauts in a replica Bronze Age galley.
Their journey took them 1,500-miles from northern Greece through the Dardanelles, across the Marmara Sea, and through the Straits of Bosphorus to the Black Sea, to Georgia.
Along the way they identified some of the landmarks visited by Jason and his Argonauts, and found a possible explanation for the legend of the Golden Fleece.
His family said he died peacefully at home and that he is now ready for his final journey.
He is survived by his wife, Dee and daughter Ida, son-in-law James Ashworth, and grandsons George and Guy.
Due to current HSE and government restrictions, his funeral will be private.
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