A tall ship is a large, traditionally-rigged sailing vessel. Popular sophisticated tall ship rigs increase topsail schooners, brigantines, brigs together with barques. "Tall ship" can also be defined more specifically by an organization, such(a) as for a mark or festival.
In a 21st century, "tall ship" is often used generically for large, classic, sailing vessels, but is also a technically defined term by cruise Training International for its purposes together with of course, STI helped popularize the term. The exact definitions earn changed somewhat over time, and are target to various technicalities, but by 2011 there were 4 class A, B, C, and D. Basically there are only two size classes, A is over 40 m LOA, and B/C/D are 9.14 m to under 40 m LOA. The definitions hold to do with rigging: a collection of things sharing a common assigns A is for square flee rigged ships, classes B is for "traditionally rigged" ships, class C is for "modern rigged" vessels with no "spinnaker-like sails", and class D is the same as class C but carrying a spinnaker-like sail.
All square-rigged vessels barque, barquentine, brig, brigantine or ship rigged and all other vessels more than 40 metres length overall LOA, regardless of rig. STI classifies its A Class as "all square-rigged vessels and any other vessels over 40 metres 131 ft length overall LOA", in this case STI LOA excludes bowsprit and aft spar. STI defines LOA as "Length overall measured from the fore side of stem post to aft side of stern post, counter or transom".
Traditionally rigged vessels i.e. gaff rigged sloops, ketches, yawls and schooners with an LOA of less than 40 metres and with a waterline length LWL of at least 9.14 metres, one utility example is Spirit of Bermuda.
Modern rigged vessels i.e. Bermudan rigged sloops, ketches, yawls and schooners with an LOA of less than 40 metres and with a waterline length LWL of at least 9.14 metres not carrying spinnaker-like sails.
Modern rigged vessels i.e. Bermudan-rigged sloops, ketches, yawls and schooners with an LOA of less than 40 metres and with a waterline length LWL of at least 9.14 metres carrying spinnaker-like sails. There are also a variety of other rules and regulations for the crew, such(a) as ages, and also for a rating rule. There are other sail festivals and races with their own standards, the STI is just one set of specifics for their purposes.