what is a flying dutchman? is it true?

Answer 1

According to folklore, the Flying Dutchman is a ghost ship that can never go home, but is doomed to sail "the seven seas" forever. The Flying Dutchman is usually spotted from afar, sometimes glowing with ghostly light. If she is hailed by another ship, her crew will often try to send messages to land, to people long since dead. The sight of this phantom ship is reckoned by seafarers to be a portent of doom.
Versions of the story are numerous in nautical folklore and are related to earlier medieval legends such as that of Captain Falkenburg who was cursed to ply the North sea until Judgement Day, playing at dice with the Devil for his own soul. According to some sources, the 17th century Dutch captain Bernard Fokke is the model for the captain of the ghost ship. Fokke was renowned for the uncanny speed of his trips from Holland to Java and was suspected of being in league with the devil to achieve this speed. However the first version to appear in print seems to be that which featured in Blackwood's Magazine for May 1821. This puts the scene of the action as the Cape of Good Hope:
She was an Amsterdam vessel and sailed from port seventy years ago. Her master’s name was Captain Hendrik Van der Decken. He was a staunch seaman, and would have his own way in spite of the devil. For all that, never a sailor under him had reason to complain; though how it is on board with them nobody knows. The story is this: that in doubling the Cape they were a long day trying to weather the Table Bay. However, the wind headed them, and went against them more and more, and Van der Decken walked the deck, swearing at the wind. Just after sunset a vessel spoke him, asking him if he did not mean to go into the bay that night. Van der Decken replied: ‘May I be eternally damned if I do, though I should beat about here till the day of judgment.' And to be sure, he never did go into that bay, for it is believed that he continues to beat about in these seas still, and will do so long enough. This vessel is never seen but with foul weather along with her.

Answer 2

The Flying Dutchman was a pirate ship from The 17th century. The Capetian of the Flying Dutchman was Davy Jones, a pirate from The Netherlands.

Answer 3

Fly·ing Dutchman (flng)
n.
1. A spectral ship said to appear in storms near the Cape of Good Hope.
2. The captain of this ship, a legendary Dutch mariner condemned to sail the seas against the wind until Judgment Day.


One superstition has it that any mariner who sees the ghost ship called the Flying Dutchman will die within the day. The tale of the Flying Dutchman trying to round the Cape of Good Hope against strong winds and never succeeding, then trying to make Cape Horn and failing there too, has been the most famous of maritime ghost stories for more 300 years. The cursed spectral ship sailing back and forth on its endless voyage, its ancient white-hair crew crying for help while hauling at her sail, inspired Samuel Taylor Coleridge to write his classic "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," to name but one famous literary work. The real Flying Dutchman is supposed to have set sail in 1660.

Answer 4

a dutchman that can fly

Answer 5

A ghost ship supposedly cursed to wander the seas forever due to its cruel, wicked captain.

Answer 6

A ghost story. Not true

Answer 7

an apparent ghost ship that collects dead souls at sea