When I was a teenager, I remember sitting in world history class dreaming of football when the teacher started talking about a weather condition known as “the doldrums.” The doldrums occur when the prevailing winds stop blowing and a extended calm settles upon the open sea—which is a serious problem if you’re a sailor relying upon wind power to get you to where you’re going.
Thousands of years ago, European sailors on a quest to reach new lands would sometimes encounter the doldrums during a voyage across the equatorial region of the Atlantic ocean.