Pequod (Moby-Dick)

Pequod (Moby-Dick)

The Pequod is a fictitious 19th century Nantucket whaleship that appears in the 1851 novel Moby-Dick by American author Herman Melville. The Pequod and her crew, commanded by Captain Ahab, are central to the story, which, after the initial chapters, takes place almost entirely aboard the ship during a long three-year whaling expedition in the Atlantic, Indian and South Pacific oceans. Most of the characters in the novel are part of the Pequod's crew, including the narrator Ishmael.

The ship is first encountered by Ishmael after he arrives in Nantucket and learns of three ships that are about to leave on three-year cruises. Tasked by his new friend the Polynesian harpooner Queequeg - or more precisely, Queequeg's idol-god, Yojo - to make the selection for them both, Ishmael, a self-described "green hand at whaling" goes to the Straight Wharf and chooses the Pequod.

It is revealed that the Pequod was named for the Algonquian-speaking Pequot tribe of Native Americans who once inhabited New England along Long Island Sound during the 17th century, but were annihilated during the Pequot War and are "now extinct as the ancient Medes". The reference to the doomed tribe is a deliberate foreshadowing of the fate of the ship and her crew.