Origins
Origin of the Terms
There exist a wide variety of vessels across the coasts of China and in the South Pacific. The large majority of these vessels are commonly referred to as junks in English. The etymology of the term junk is of particular interest. While the widely understood meaning of junk as discarded material originates from the Middle English word jonk, which once was a specific nautical term meaning old cable or rope not intended to be thrown away or wasted, the term junk as it refers to Chinese water vessels comes from a variety of translations.1
Various sources cite the origin of the term junk as being from a Portuguese term junco, a French term junque, a Dutch term jonk, a Malay term jong, a Javanese term djong, and a Malay-Javanese term jung or ajung. In addition, Charles Fried Neumann cites in an endnote that junk is the Canton pronunciation of chuan.2 Although some sources state that these terms are rooted in one another, the specific origins of these individual terms, in turn, are outside the scope of this project.3
It is interesting to see that the term junk, used to refer to Chinese ships, is not a direct translation or transliteration of the Chinese term for ship or boat. While the large majority of works I found used the term junk, the often notated translation in Chinese is chuan, which translates to boat. [The character is at the top of each page for reference.] Almost all variations of junks include the use of the character chuan. Historically, this points to the presence of Portuguese, French, and Dutch explorers and traders in the South Pacific as a force determining the use of the term junk in British and American English. Contrarily, the term sampan, referring to a smaller Chinese water craft, comes from the characters san (three) and pan (planks) in Chinese.4 It is difficult to determine the reasons behind why the general and categorical term junk is not a transliteration and the specific and less frequently used term sampan is a transliteration.
Origin of the Vessels
Although the origin of most water vessels around the world is accepted to be the log dugout, most scholars agree that the origin of Chinese junks and sampans is most likely a raft, perhaps a set of bound bamboo stems.5 It is the construction of the Chinese hull that sets these ships apart from other ships across the world. The Chinese hull (however the sides are built) is an elongated structure with separated into bulkheads [vertical structures that divide the ship into compartments], similar to the stem of the bamboo is of has partitions called 'septa.' Shipbuilding can historically be separated into 'clinker-built' boats, where the strakes [planks forming sides of the ship] overlap, and 'carvel-built' vessels, where the strakes are fixed edge to edge to create smooth inner and outer surfaces of the vessel. This distinction is shown geographically by the evidence of the clinker boats built in Europe and the carvel boats in the majority of the other parts of the world, including China.6
A typical ocean-going junk is the Jiangsu freighter, also known as the 'sand ship.' Pinewood is used for a flat-bottom with the central lengthwise timber being slightly larger than the rest and working as a keel. These often contained at least 14 bulkheads and the sides were strengthened by wales, which are thick strakes. Some of the prow and stern planks are from trees grown for this particular shape. The bow and stern are 'bluff' [flattened] and therefore can withstand even the worst weather conditions. These ships have five masts, something almost all sources commented as being extraordinarily surprising considering most ships have two masts. Almost all ocean-going junks had multiple masts, while most riverine junks were equipped with two. Another particularity regarding the masts is that ocean-going junks with multiple masts typically stagger their masts on the port and starboard sides, whereas most other ships arrange their masts along the center of the vessel. All sea-going ships are also completely devoid of stays. These are often considered to be standard of the Sung period, just prior to the Ming period, and a predecessor of most ocean-going junks.7