A pram or pramm describes a type of shallow-draught flat-bottomed ship.

They were used in Europe during the 18th century, particularly in the Baltic Sea

Baltic Sea

The Baltic Sea is a brackish mediterranean sea located in Northern Europe, from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 20°E to 26°E longitude. It is bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, the Great Belt and...

 during the Great Northern War

Great Northern War

The Great Northern War was a conflict in which a coalition led by the Tsardom of Russia successfully contested the supremacy of the Swedish Empire in northern Central Europe and Eastern Europe. The initial leaders of the anti-Swedish alliance were Peter I the Great of Russia, Frederick IV of...

 and Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...

, as the pram's shallow draught allowed it to approach the shore. They typically carried 10-20 guns on one gun deck, and had either two or three masts. They were the kind of transport Napoleon would have used to cross the English channel

English Channel

The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...

.

"Pram" also refers to a small utility boat with a squarish rather than pointed bow. This type of pram provides a more efficient use of space than does a traditional skiff

Skiff

The term skiff is used for a number of essentially unrelated styles of small boat. The word is related to ship and has a complicated etymology: "skiff" comes from the Middle English skif, which derives from the Old French esquif, which in turn derives from the Old Italian schifo, which is itself of...

 of the same size. The Mirror

Mirror (dinghy)

The Mirror is a very popular sailing dinghy, with more than 70,000 built.The Mirror was named after the Daily Mirror, a UK newspaper with a largely working class distribution. The Mirror was from the start promoted as an affordable boat, and as a design it has done a great deal to make dinghy...

 and Optimist

Optimist (dinghy)

The Optimist is a small, single-handed sailing dinghy intended for use by children up to the age of 15. Nowadays boats are usually made of fiber reinforced plastic, although wooden boats are still built....

sailboats are examples of this form.