Catamaran boats have existed for centuries; the time of their exact birth is unknown to Western scholars and historians.
They are, by definition, multihulled ships in which buoyancy is produced and weight is distributed by/to more than one hull. The first recorded use of the catamaran, using this definition, occurred in 1697 in the Bay of Bengal, India.
The English buccaneer William Dampier, who first witnessed them, claimed that they were called 'Catamarans', and ever since then that has been the name applied to any multihulled boat. Similar boats were later discovered in the distant islands of the South Pacific. The native peoples of these islands used the craft to cover long distances, enabling the settlement of large swaths of ocean.
The use of the catamaran boats continued to be limited to native peoples of Asia until the 19th and 20th century. During the 19th century a single boat builder in the United States, Nathanael Herreshoff, began constructing these multihulled boats. They were subsequently banned by boat racing authorities and did not gain widespread use until the 20th century when they began being employed for both recreational purposes and logistical endeavors.
In 1947 a famous surfer, Woodbridge Brown, began building ocean-worthy catamarans in Hawaii. An English boat factory started manufacturing catamarans the following decade. These boats proved to be highly competitive and won many boat races.
Catamarans grew larger and faster near the end of the 20th century, they were employed as ferries and military ships; their high speed and weight carrying capacity making them ideal vessels for these purposes.
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