Sculling

Sculling is a word that has two different meanings:

Competitive sculling

In competitive rowing, sculling means to propel a sculling boat or skiff, using two oars (one in each hand), as opposed to rowing which, strictly speaking, means propelling the boat with a single oar held by both hands. Most commonly, sculling is carried out by a single sculler in a single scull, but it is also common to see races involving sculling boats that contain two, four, and even eight scullers.

Single oar sculling

In the other meaning, sculling is a means of propelling watercraft by using an oar without the wasteful backstroke of rowing. Its origins are ancient enough to be unknown, but include common use in ancient China[1] (some time before the third century, AD), pre-Columbian American Indians on the Great Lakes, and most famously by gondola boat pilots from medieval through modern times in Venice, Italy.

Single-oar sculling is an advancement over rowing because, rather than having to lift the oar and move it back to its original position, the oar remains submerged in the water, rotated slightly so that its grip on the water is reversed, to allow it to propel the boat in the same direction as the initial stroke.

In single-oar sculling, an oar is usually locked by pivot onto a boat's bow and/or stern, and pushed to one side of the boat with the blade turned so that this will generate forward thrust, then rotated ninety degrees so that the return thrust pushes in the same direction. The greater efficiency of this system has resulted in an old Chinese saying, "a scull equals three oars".

This continuous propulsion method of moving a boat is considered fundamentally similar to marine propellers, even an inspiration for them.