A three-masted sailing ship where only the front mast is square-rigged (has horizontal sails) and the other two masts use fore-and-aft sails, designed for efficient long-distance sailing.
From Spanish 'barcantina,' a variant of 'barca' (boat) combined with '-antina.' The term evolved from Mediterranean shipbuilding terminology in the 16th-17th centuries as a hybrid design between fully square-rigged ships and schooners.
The barquantine was the container ship of the Age of Sail—it was cheaper to crew than a full barque but could carry more cargo than a schooner, so merchants loved it for trading routes from the 1700s through the steam era.
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