A kettle with brown taan is simmering over a fire. “It must be warm so that it can be lubricated over the sails,” a volunteer tells a visitor to the Taanddag at Center Sailing Heritage Hoorn. “The name ‘the brown fleet’, as the historic fishing fleet is called, is due to Taan, because of the color.”
Until the midway through the last century, sailing, nets and ropes of fishing vessels were made of nature fibers. The waning served to protect them against fungi and rot. Due to the arrival of plastic fibers, the rans fell out of favor. But not in the center of Sailing Heritage Hoorn. They still like to work with natural materials there.
Bark of oak trees
“That stuff is a natural agent that is in the bark of trees,” explains Dirk Lont of Center Sailing Heritage Hoorn. “There is a lot of tannin in the resin of the tree, which protects the tree against fungi and rot. Previously it happened with oak trees, later with the bark of the acacia tree that was taken from India, because it contains much more tannin. The good is essential for cotton sailing.”
Watch in the video below how sailing are tackled. The text continues under the video.