Dr. Apostolos Delis has earned a prestigious Horizon 2020 European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant 2016. The program entitled Seafaring Lives in Transition.Mediterranean Maritime Labour and Shipping during Globalization, 1850s-1920s’ explores the transition from sail to steam navigation and the effects of this technological innovation on seafaring populations in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea, between the 1850s and the 1920s, whose lives were drastically changed by the advent of the steam. The project addresses the changes through the actors, seafarers, ship-owners and their families, focusing on the adjustment of seafaring lives to a novel socio-economic reality. It investigates the maritime Labour market, the evolving relations among ship-owner, captain, crew and their local societies, life on board and ashore, as well as the development of new business strategies, trade routes and navigation patterns. Researchers from Italy, France, Spain, Ukraine and Greece participate in the project, whereas four Ph.D. dissertations will be carried out in academic institutions of Spain, France, Italy and Greece.

Short Bio

Apostolos Delis was born in Volos-Greece in 1971. He studied Ancient History at the Universities of Siena and Bologna and Maritime Archaeology and History at the University of Bristol. He completed his PhD thesis in 2010 at the Ionian University entitled: “Hermoupolis (Syros): the shipbuilding centre of the sailing merchant marine, 1830-80”. During the academic year 2010-11 he worked as a post doc researcher in the Centre de la Méditerranée Moderne et Contemporaine (CMMC) of the University of Nice, working in the program ANR/NAVIGOCORPUS: Corpus des itinéraires des navires de commerce, XVIIe-XIXe siècles. Since 2012 he has been working as a researcher in the Institute for Mediterranean Studies/ FORTH in two research projects: 1) “ELISTOKAINO”: the History of Innovation in Greece, 19th-20th centuries, on the topic“Innovation in the Greek and Mediterranean Shipbuilding Technology, 19th-20th centuries” and 2) “THALIS”: The Black Sea and its port-cities, 1774-1914. Development, convergence and linkages with the global economy (http://blacksea.gr/), on the topic“The port of Marseille and the Black Sea trade in the nineteenth century”. His research interests lie in the maritime economic and social history, history of technology of the sailing ship, the shipbuilding industry, port history and the institutions of shipping business. He is the author of a monograph entitled “Mediterranean Wooden Shipbuilding. Economy, Technology and Institutions in Syros in the Nineteenth Century”, Leiden, BRILL (2015). His work has been published in Greek and international journals and collective volumes such as the European Review of Economic History, Urban History, International Journal of Maritime History, Historica.