How it began
Pinisi names a rig, not a hull. Ships carrying it were mainly built by the Konjo-speaking people of Ara in Bulukumba regency, South Sulawesi, and sailed by Bugis and Makassarese seafarers. European-style fore-and-aft rigs are recorded on local ships only from the first half of the 19th century, and large numbers of Sulawesi boats carried such sails only in the early 20th century. The earliest clear mention of the word is in a Dutch periodical of 1917. Local traditions claim a much older origin.
Before it existed
UNESCO places the pinisi within a tradition of Austronesian boatbuilding and navigation that is thousands of years old and produced many kinds of watercraft. Until the middle of the 20th century Sulawesi sailors called their ships palari, the name of the hull type best suited to the pinisi rig.
How it works
A pinisi carries seven to eight sails on two masts, arranged like a gaff ketch with the taller mast forward. Unlike most Western ships with such a rig, the gaffs are fixed in place about halfway up the masts. The two main sails are not hoisted with their spars but pulled out along the standing gaffs like curtains.
What changed first
Before Indonesia's traditional trading fleet was motorized in the 1970s and 1980s, vessels with the pinisi rig were the largest Indonesian sailing ships and worked as engineless cargo carriers across the archipelago. SeaTrek describes them as the engineless trading ships built and sailed in the 20th century by the Bugis and Makassan people.
Where it stands today
UNESCO inscribed "Pinisi, art of boatbuilding in South Sulawesi" in 2017. Boatbuilding centers are at Tana Beru, Bira and Batu Licin, where about 70 percent of the population make a living from boatbuilding and navigation. The word is now often applied to the large motorized timber ships built in the same style, some of which still carry small auxiliary sails.
