did a roman merchant ship have a galley
I agree completely that most Greek and Roman merchant ships were sailing ships, not galleys, for the reasons given. To be honest, my information about merchant galleys comes from a novel, and the author may have been wrong.he sailors, who usually did not row, were also free volunteers. OTOH, merchant galleys, which were owned by civilians, used slave rowers. Slaves were plentiful in Greek, and especially Roman, times and relatively inexpensive to buy.