The objective of this paper is to show how the French Royal Navy, faced with multiple challenges of different kinds, has built in the 17th and 18th centuries a particularly complex military-industrial and organisational tool, which foreshadows the most up-to-date industrial and logistical organisations. By reinterpreting this pre-industrial episode, one could not only set out the major principles that constitute the foundations of the logistical and SCM backgrounds (anticipation, reactivity, standardisation, normalisation, productivity, modularity, flexibility, interoperability, fluidity, continuity), but also some logistical archetypes (strategic control of space and strategic control of time, transport infrastructures and accessibility, global sourcing and suppliers' networks, nomenclatures and production ranges, warehouses and stocks availability).