Sewn-Plank Boat Construction Among a South China Coastal Minority Community

Jay Mok*, Xu Lu (许路), and Shou Jiaqi (寿佳琦)

Sewn-plank boat construction, the technique of fastening hull planks through stitching rather than iron fastenings, is widely recognised as a defining feature of the ancient Indian Ocean and South Asian maritime world, yet its presence within Chinese boatbuilding traditions has received only marginal scholarly attention. This paper presents newly recovered evidence for the survival of this tradition within a small minority community of Persian heritage on the South China coast. Fieldwork records from the early 1980s, gathered during ethnographic survey and subsequently overlooked in the literature, provide the initial documentary basis. A breakthrough came through targeted fieldwork conducted between November 2025 and March 2026, yielding extensive cross-referenced oral testimony confirming that sewn-plank vessels were actively employed in coastal net-fishing by this community into the 1980s. Crucially, the last generation of elderly fishermen retain living memory both of working aboard sewn boats and of participating in their construction. This paper presents this oral evidence alongside comparative analysis situating the South China tradition within the broader Indo-Pacific sewn-boat complex, with particular attention to typological and technological connections with the Philippine Balangay and Vietnamese Cham watercraft, both of which have well-established archaeological and ethnological documentation. The paper further notes that the feasibility of reconstructing a full-scale vessel of approximately six metres is currently under preliminary assessment. The findings contribute to debates on Indian Ocean technological exchange, the maritime heritage of South China Sea minority communities, and the methodological value of oral testimony in reconstructing regional boatbuilding traditions.