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The INA Quarterly
Volume 22 No. 1 Spring 1995
MEMBERSHIP
3 Letter from the President Institute of Nautical Archaeology
P.O. Drawer HG
Frederick M. Hocker College Station, TX 77841-5137
4 "Coffins of the Brave": A Return to Lake Hear firsthand of the latest discov-
Champlain's War of 1812 Ship Graveyard series in nautical archaeology. Mem-
Kevin J. Crisman bers receive the INA Quarterly, sci-
entific reports, and book discounts.
9 Albania's Adriatic Coast: Regular ......... $30
An Unexplored Region of the Mediterranean
Elizabeth Greene and Peter G. van Alfen Contributor ...... $50
12 A Ninth-Century Shipwreck near Bozburun, Supporter.......$100
Turkey Benefactor ...... $1000
Frederick M. Hocker
Student/ Retired .. $20
15 The Canary Islands Shipwreck Survey Checks in U.S. currency shoulder made
Checks in U.S. currency should be made
Brett A. Phaneuf and Peter W. Hitchcock payabletoINA. Theportionof anydo-
nation in excess of $10.00 is a tax-de-
18 News and Notes ductible, charitable contribution.
The articles in this issue present a preview of some upcoming INA projects. In 1995 the Institute of Nautical
Archaeology begins new excavations in the United States and Turkey and expands into Albania and the Canary
Islands.
On the cover: Macdonough's Victory on Lake Champlain, Sept 11'h, 1814. This naval action, the last ever fought on the lake,
changed the course of the War of 1812 in one morning and led to a swift cessation of hostilities. The print was engraved
by Benjamin Tanner in 1816. Courtesy of the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum.
April 1995 by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology. All rights reserved.
INA welcomes requests to reprint INA Quarterly articles and illustrations. Please contact the editors for permission.
Submissions to the INA Quarterly are subject to review by the editors and editorial board. Contributors will receive five copies of the
issue in which their article appears. Contact the editors for a style sheet and guidelines. Please address all communication to the
Editors, INA Quarterly, P.O. Drawer HG, College Station, TX 77841-5137; tel (409) 845-6694, fax (409) 845-6399, e-mail: nautical@tamu.edu
The Institute of Nautical Archaeology is a non-profit scientific and educational organization, incorporated in 1972. Since 1976, INA
has been affiliated with Texas A&M University where INA faculty teach in the Nautical Archaeology Program of the Department of
Anthropology.
The INA Quarterly was formerly the INA Newsletter (vols. 1-18). Editors: Elizabeth Greene
David J. Stewart
-Letter from the President-
Without the generous support of the following individuals, corporations, and institutions in 1994, the work that INA
did would have been impossible. These people and companies deserve as much recognition for INA's work as do the
archaeologists, conservators, and reconstructors whose exploits figure more prominently in these pages. We at the
Institute would like to thank them as well as the directors, listed on the back cover of each issue of the INA Quarterly, for
their help in the last year. It is their interest in our work that makes the Institute of Nautical Archaeology more than an
academic dream.
These endowments, given to Texas
A&M University, help father the
goals of INA:
The George T. and Gladys H. Abell
Professorship
The Mr. and Mrs. J. Brown Cook
Graduate Fellowship
The Frederick R. Mayer Faculty
Fellowship
The Frederick R. Mayer Professorship
The INA Faculty Fellowship
The Meadows Foundation
Professorship
The Nautical Archaeology Faculty
Fellowship
The Mr. & Mrs. Ray H. Siegfried II
Graduate Fellowship
The George O. Yamini Family Chair
in Liberal Arts
The Sara W. and George O. Yamini
Professorship
Organizations
American Research Center in Egypt, Inc.
Amoco Foundation, Inc
The California Community Foundation
CitiBank
The Anna C. & Oliver C. Coburn Fund
College of Liberal Arts, Texas A&M
University
The Community Foundation
The John Brown Cook Foundation
Coming, Incorporated
Covington & Burling
Cressi-sub, Italy
Douglas R. DeCluitt Foundation
First National Bank of Park Cities
IBM
INA Films
INA Foundation
The Institute for Aegean Prehistory
Kodak-Egypt
Lubrizol, Incorporated
The Nason Foundation
The National Endowment for the
Humanities
The National Geographic Society
The Palynology Lab at Texas A&M
University
Philip Morris
Phizer-Egypt
The Recanati Center for Maritime
Studies, University of Haifa
The Karen & Stephen Susman
Philanthropic Fund of the
Endowment Fund of the Jewish
Community of Houston
Scuba Duba Corporation
Southwest INK
Special Expeditions, Inc.
Texas A&M University
Development Foundation
Texas A&M Research Foundation
Texas A&M Hyperbaric Lab
Texas A&M University
The Tulsa Archaeological Society
The Malcolm & Carol Wiener
Laboratory for Aegean & Near
Eastern Dendrochronology
Sponsors
Charles W. Consolvo
Mr. Erik Jonsson
Dr. Ernestine A. O'Connell
Mr. Billings K. Ruddock
Benefactors
Dr. & Mrs. Richard Bienia
Dr. Allan C Campbell
J.E.R. Chilton
Mr. & Mrs. Charles B. Collins
Mr. John DeLapa
Marilyn & George Lodge
Doris & Roy Matthews
Mr. & Mrs. T. H. McCasland, Jr.
Marjorie & Drew Morris
Alice & Howard Rankin
Mr. & Mrs. John L. Stern
Karen & Stephen Susman
Mary & Richard Rosenberg
Robert Rubenstein
Hazel & Ronald Vandehey
Supporters
Ms. Carol Adler
Mr. & Mrs. L. Barton
Alexander
Mr. & Mrs. Thomas Anderson
Mr. David A. Batchelor
Mr. Kurt F. Baty
Ms. Sue Beaghler
Mr. Kenneth S. Beall, Jr.
Matthew Bender IV
Ms. Marianne Buchwalter
Mr. & Mrs. Lionel Casson
Mr. & Mrs. Nelson H. Corbett
Barbara E. Cox
Frederick J. Cox
Dona & William Dales
Marilyn & Thomas Deering
Mr. & Mrs. Robert F Dennis
Mr. & Mrs. Franklin Drake
Mrs. Ruth L. Dugan.
Mr. & Mrs. Spencer Ehrman
Mrs. Cynthia J. Eiseman
Mr. E. Engman
Ulku & H.C.M. Erzurumlu
Ellen & William Farr
Ms. Hilde P. Fordyce
Mrs. Marion Gifford
Mr. Robert C. Craff
Dr. & Mrs. Gerald S. Green
Frederick Parker Gregg, M.D.
Jami & Mike Hanna
Chatten Hayes
Mr. & Mrs. Edmund Hayes, Jr.
Dr. & Mrs. Edward Hendricks
Dr. Faith Hentschel
Jean B. James
Mr. Audrey Jarach
Samuel E. Johnson
Mrs. Joan P. Kelley
Mr. Martin Klein
Mr. & Mrs. Weldon D. Kruger
Mr. Robert C. Kuzela
Mr. David A. Larson
Mr. Stanley R. Loeb
Mr. & Mrs. Edward Lynch
Mary Marsh
Mr. Thomas R. Mackenzie
Anna M. McCann
Mr. Brian McLaggan
Judith G. McNeil
Mr. Thomas A. Mueller
Elizabeth & Clay Myers
Ms. Madeline B. Nelson
Mr. Neville B. Pamment
Mr. Murray W. Pegler
Ms. Ann Pepe
Dr. & Mrs. David W. Perlman
Mrs. Anne J. Pierce
Mr. & Mrs. Charles Pitman
Dr. Alice S. Riginos
Kurt Rosenberg
Mr. & Mrs. T. Newton Russell
Allan Saunders
Jennifer Saunders
Mr. & Mrs. Ladd Seaberg
Mr. & Mrs. W.F. Searle, Jr.
Mr. & Mrs. Norman Sepenuk
Mr. & Mrs. John Sheepshanks
John & Joan Shipley
Robert & Beverly Shoemaker
David Steinberg
Alison Stenger
Alice Stephens
Melody & Mark Teppola
Mrs. Margot K. Thomson
Mr. & Mrs. Robert K. Vincent, Jr.
Mrs. Nancy P. Weston
Mr. & Mrs. Arthur Whinston
Mr. & Mrs. W.M. Whitmire
Dr. & Mrs. John Wild
Theda & Herbert Wild
Sabine Artaud Wild
Mr. Roger A. Williamson
Mr. Patrick S. Wilson
Shirley A. & Elwin R. Wilson
Mr. & Mrs. R. L. Womer
INA Quarterly 22.1
"Coffins of the Brave":
A Return to Lake Champlain's War of 1812 Ship Graveyard
By Kevin J. Crisman
At Whitehall, New York, the small port that marked the southern terminus of Lake Champlain navigation, Yale profes-
sor Benjamin Silliman boarded the steamer Congress on a cool, damp September morning in 1819 (fig. 1). Several weeks
earlier the professor had embarked on a tour of historical sites and geological formations between Hartford, Connecti-
cut and Quebec, and he was now on the final leg of the trip to Canada. Although suffering from the effects of "a severe
ague in his face and head," Silliman nevertheless remained on Congress's open deck as the steamer cast off from the
dock at Whitehall and began the passage down the lake. Just beyond the first bend in the channel was a sight that he
was determined to include on his historical itinerary: the roofed-over hulks of the U.S. Navy's War of 1812 Lake Champlain
squadron.
From his vantage point on the deck of the steamer Silliman thought the warships had a melancholy aspect:
As we passed rapidly by a few seamen shewed their heads through the grim portholes from which ... the cannon
poured fire and death, and we caught a glimpse of the decks, that were then covered with the mutilated and the
slain, and deluged with their generous blood. -Sparless, black and frowning, these now dismantled ships look like
the coffins of the brave, and will remain, as long as worms and rot allow them, sad monuments of the bloody
conflict.
While the decayed ships moored stem-to-stern on the side of the narrow channel were not much to look at in 1819, just
five years earlier they had fought desperate naval action on Champlain's waters, a fight that Theodore Roosevelt later
termed "the greatest naval battle of the war."
The late summer of 1814 was
perhaps one of the darkest hours
in the history of the United States.
The "War of 1812," begun two
years earlier to punish Britain for
its interference with American
trade, had taken a series of disas-
trous turns, and the future of the
republic appeared bleak. By 1814
Britain's Royal Navy had estab-
lished a blockade of the American
coast and brought all commerce
to a standstill; the U.S. Govern-
ment, which operated largely on
revenue generated from trade,
was running out of both money
and credit. British raiding par-
ties attacked shipping and ports
up and down the seaboard with
impunity, and on August 24 had
succeeded in capturing and burn-
ing the nation's capital at Wash-
ington, D.C. Several anti-war
New England states were threat-
ening to secede from the union.
Perhaps most ominously, a huge
British army was massing along
the Canadian border near Lake
Champlain, poised to invade the
United States and seize territory
Map: K. Crisman
Fig. 1: Lake Champlain during the War of 1812.
that could be used for bargaining
in peace negotiations that were
beginning in Ghent, Belgium. By
September of 1814, utter defeat
and financial ruin seemed almost
inevitable.
The U.S. Navy's senior officer
on Lake Champlain, Master
Commandant Thomas Macdon-
ough, had been working dili-
gently for nearly year to prepare
for this crisis. In the waning
months of 1813 Macdonough re-
ceived word through spies that
the British were commencing
work on large warships that
could easily brush aside his rag-
tag collection of armed merchant
sloops. He alerted the Navy De-
partment in Washington to this
danger, and in the late winter of
1814 was given permission to
build a new squadron. New York
shipwright Noah Brown, already
famed for his construction of U.S.
Navy vessels on Lake Erie in
1813, was hired to construct the
Lake Champlain ships. Brown
and his carpenters went to work
at Vergennes, Vermont and in less
INA Quarterly 22.1
than three months' time built and outfitted the 26-
gun flagship Saratoga, six gunboats mounting two
guns apiece, and completed an unfinished steam-
boat hull as the 17-gun schooner Ticonderoga. In
late July Noah's brother, Adam Brown, brought
400 shipwrights back to the lake and in 19 days
launched the final addition to Macdonough's force,
a 20-gun brig called Eagle (fig. 2).
With these ships, Macdonough met the long-
awaited British invasion early on the morning of
Sunday, September 11, 1814. The battle that fol-
lowed was fought at point-blank range, and
proved to be one of the bloodiest naval actions of
the war. Macdonough had arrayed his ships in a
"line ahead" formation inside of Plattsburgh Bay
prior to the attack, and had taken the precaution
of anchoring his ships with a series of spring lines
that allowed them to turn their broadsides to face
in any direction. These spring lines saved the day: Fig. 2
when all of the starboard guns on Saratoga were vessel
destroyed, Macdonough turned his flagship in a Platts
half-circle and opened fire with the undamaged crews
port battery
After two-and-one-half-hours of fighting Macdonough
accepted the surrender of four Royal Navy vessels: the 36-
gun frigate Confiance, the 16-gun brig Linnet, and the 11-
gun sloops Chubb and Finch. Every ship that participated
in the battle was riddled with shot holes and casualties on
both sides were fearsome. One surviving English mid-
shipman later declared: "were you to see my jacket, waist-
coat, and trowsers, you would be astonished how I escaped
as I did, for they are literally torn all to rags with shot and
splinters; the upper part of my hat was also shot away."
Many other sailors were not as lucky on that grim day.
Lourresy or me LaKe Lnamplam n antu
Fig. 3: The Lake Champlain Naval Squadron "In Ordinary" at Whil
ships had their top masts and spars removed and their decks were hot
Drawing: K Crisman
: The reconstructed profile of the U.S. Navy Brig Eagle. This 20-gun
was built in just 19 days, and launched one month before the battle of
burgh Bay. A shortage of sailors forced her captain to fill out the gun
with U.S. Army band musicians and convicts from a chain gang.
Macdonough's victory profoundly altered the course
of the war. The British army advancing down the New
York shore of Lake Champlain quickly retreated to Canada.
Word of the Royal Navy debacle, when it reached Ghent,
led the British negotiators to drop their demands for Ameri-
can concessions and agree to a settlement that was honor-
able to all parties. The treaty of peace was signed on Christ-
mas Eve, 1814.
Several weeks after the Battle of Plattsburgh Bay, the
American naval squadron on Lake Champlain sailed south
to Whitehall, and here the ships were placed "in ordinary"
after the war officially ended (fig. 3). Their
guns, spars, and top masts were removed,
their decks were housed over with board roofs
to protect them from the weather, and a small
contingent of sailors was assigned to pump
out the bilges on a daily basis. The green-tim-
bered hulls rotted very quickly, and by the time
Professor Benjamin Silliman viewed the
squadron in 1819 some of the ships were de-
veloping serious leaks. By the following year
it was necessary to move the squadron into a
narrow river north of Whitehall to ensure that
none of the vessels sank where it could block
the main channel of the lake. Five years later,
in 1825, the partly-submerged ships were auc-
tioned off to salvagers, and the naval station
at Whitehall was shut down.
ne Museum The two largest vessels of the squadron,
Fehall. The Confiance and Saratoga, were entirely broken
ised over. up in the nineteenth century, and salvagers,
INA Quarterly 22.1
Drawing. K. Crisman
Fig. 4: The reconstructed midship section of the U.S. Navy Brig Eagle. The Eagle had an extraordinarily shallow hull to navigate Lake
Champlain's shoal waters and exhibited a number of shortcuts in both materials and assembly techniques that enabled completion in time
for the Battle of Plattsburgh Bay.
winter ice, and decay combined to destroy the exposed
portions of the other ships. The location of the submerged
wrecks was not forgotten, however, and two of them were
pulled from the water in the twentieth century. The first
of these, the brig Linnet, was drawn up on the river bank
in 1949 by souvenir hunters and two broken cast-iron guns
were recovered. Winter ice subsequently dragged Linnet
back under the river. The second salvage of a hull took
place in 1958 as part of Whitehall's bicentennial celebra-
tion. The schooner Ticonderoga was cut into six sections,
lifted from the river, then reassembled under a shed be-
hind the "Skenesboro Museum" in downtown Whitehall.
My interest in Lake Champlain's War of 1812 fleet be-
gan in 1981, when I recorded the battered remains of the
Ticonderoga as part of an undergraduate term paper project
at the University of Vermont. While only the bottom and
stern assembly of the schooner survived, the hull showed
evidence of both the original steamboat design and the
efforts taken to convert it into a sailing warship.
Ticonderoga was a fascinating wreck in every way, and the
natural question that arose at the end of the study was:
"are there any more ships from Macdonough's squadron?"
Local historians assured me that there were indeed more
wrecks to be found in the Poultney River, about one mile
north of town. During the summer of 1981 Arthur Cohn
and I organized a diver survey of the river to inventory
what remained of Macdonough's squadron.
The Poultney is probably not on anyone's list of exotic
diving destinations. The river channel is relatively nar-
row, and not very deep, only reaching about 12 feet (3.65
m) in the center. The water is a rich brown color, and the
visibility beneath it could be measured only in inches. This
was my first experience with low-visibility diving, and had
it not been for the lure of sunken 1812-era warships I might
well have skipped the whole venture. Our persistence
paid off, for in two day's of diving we located three wrecks:
Adam Brown's brig Eagle, the captured British brig Linnet,
and one of the six 2-gun gunboats built for Macdonough
by Noah Brown. The 115-foot-long Eagle was in particu-
larly good condition, for the hull had fallen over on its
port side after sinking and that side was preserved up to
the level of the gunports. All three wrecks obviously con-
tained a wealth of information about naval design and con-
struction during the 1814 campaign on the lake.
Cohn and I returned to the Poultney River in 1982 and
1983 with a team of ten divers and spent a total of five
weeks investigating our finds. We first conducted a basic
survey of all three hulls, then focused our efforts on re-
cording every detail of Eagle's massive structure. Progress
in that murky water was slow, but the shallow depths al-
lowed a total of four to six hours of diving a day. By the
end of the 1983 season we had filled a large three-ring
binder with thousands of measurements and sketches of
Eagle's timbers.
The process of reconstructing Eagle's hull on paper re-
quired nearly a year to complete, but revealed many of
the shortcuts taken by Adam Brown to complete the ves-
sel before the British began their invasion of the Champlain
Valley (fig. 4). The brig's frames were all of substantial
dimensions and were adequately fastened with iron bolts
and spikes, but they were composed of a strange assort-
ment of timber. For example, among the many woods
INA Quarterly 22.1
THE US NAVY BRIG
EAGLE
RECONSTRUCTED SECTION
MIDSHIP FRAME
FEET
used in the construction of the floor timbers and lower
futtocks were white pine and spruce, relatively weak and
rot-prone species that would never have been acceptable
under normal circumstances. It was clear to us that in or-
der to get the ship finished on time just about any tree
growing in the vicinity of the shipyard was incorporated
into Eagle's structure.
Adam Brown's second departure from accepted ship-
building practices was his omission of knees from Eagle's
hull. These naturally-curved timbers are typically used
throughout a wooden ship to strengthen key areas such as
the deck. An ocean-going warship built without knees
would have quickly worked itself to pieces in the first storm
it met, but Brown evidently felt that in this instance he did
not have the time to locate, shape, and install knees. Sail-
ing conditions on Lake Champlain are usually not as de-
manding as those on the high seas, and in any event the
brig only had to last for one battle. Eagle may not have
been built to the highest standards and was undoubtedly
somewhat rough in appearance, but its addition to
Macdonough's squadron just two weeks before Platts-
burgh Bay proved crucial to Macondough's success.
The study of Eagle was completed as a master's thesis
for the Texas A&M Nautical Archaeology Program in 1984
and subsequently published as a book, but the brig Linnet
and the U.S. Navy gunboat have never received the same
treatment. This neglect has not been for lack of interest on
our part, but can be ascribed to the many other well-pre-
served historic wrecks and submerged archaeological sites
that have distracted Cohn and me over the past decade.
rnorograpn courtesy or rne riew rorK rate arcmves
Fig. 5: The salvaged hull of the Linnet in 1949. After removing
two old iron guns and various souvenir timbers, the salvagers al-
lowed the hull to slip back into the river.
The time has arrived, however, to finish work on the two
warships, and we are currently organizing a five-week
nautical archaeology field school for the summer of 1995.
One of the driving forces behind our return to the
Poultney River this year is a tiny mollusc called the 'zebra
mussel'. These creatures are native to certain freshwater
bodies in Europe, but were accidently introduced into the
North American Great Lakes a decade ago with devastat-
ing results. Zebra mussels will colonize just about any
hard surface and then multiply in fantastic numbers; many
wrecks in the Great Lakes have been hit and details of their
design and construction have been entirely obliterated by
a thick layer of mussels.
Zebra mussels began showing up in Lake Champlain
two years ago, and within the next five to ten years most
of the pristine wrecks lying exposed above the lakebottom
will probably become vast mussel colonies. For those of
us studying the nautical archaeology of the lake it will be
the end of the "looks-like-it-sank-yesterday" era. The
warm, shallow waters at the southern end of the lake
should be the first to be heavily infested, and the 1812
warships will soon be lost under a coating of molluscs.
The 1995 work in the Poultney River will focus on re-
trieving every possible scrap of information from the Lin-
net and the gunboat. The Linnet now consists of a midship
portion of the hull, with part of the keel, keelson, outside
planking, and frames. The frames extend out to the turn
of the bilge on one side of the vessel. Because this vessel
was briefly pulled from the water by salvagers in 1949 it is
unlikely to contain many artifacts (fig. 5). The gunboat is
more complete, and has the lower portions of the stem and
stempost, the entire length of both the keel and keelson,
and most of the frames. The starboard side of the hull
extends out to the turn of the bilge, is partially buried un-
der silt, and appears to be in a very good state of preserva-
tion. Our initial survey of the gunboat in 1982 turned up a
few grapeshot and spikes, pieces of cast-iron ballast, and
a brass uniform button (fig. 6) embossed with the crest of
the 13th U.S. Infantry Regiment. A critical shortage of sail-
ors forced Macdonough to round out the gunboat crews
with soldiers borrowed from the army.
The underwater study of the two wreck sites will be
carried out by a team of eight to ten divers. Our schedule
for the field school calls for one week of orientation and
training, followed by a three-week campaign of excava-
tion and recording that will begin on July 10. Most of our
time on the wrecks will be spent measuring timber dimen-
sions and spacing, fastening patterns and construction fea-
tures, frame sections, and finally retrieving small samples
of wood for identification purposes. This data will be
used to prepare plans of both wrecks as they currently exist,
as well as reconstruction plans that show the probable ap-
pearance of the brig and gunboat as they sailed the lake in
1814 (fig. 7).
INA Quarterly 22.1
I look forward to returning to
the War of 1812 ship graveyard at
Whitehall, for there are many ques-
tions about the ships and their crews
that remain unanswered. The Lin-
net and gunboat were part of one of
the most dramatic events in the
early history of the United States.
Information they can yield about
nineteenth-century ship design, the
naval construction race on the lake
during the War of 1812, and the piv-
otal Battle of Plattsburgh Bay should
more than repay us for the time
spent under the Poultney River this
summer. After a twelve-year ab-
sence I feel as if we are returning to
pay our long-overdue respects to
two old and very close friends.
Crisman, K.J.
1987 The Eagle: An Amer
Annapolis, Md.
Everest, A.S.
1981 The War of 1812 in t
Hickey, D.R.
1989 The War of 1812: A
Photo: K. Cameron
Fig. 6: Brass uniform button for the U.S.
Army's 13th Infantry regiment. This button
was found on the gunboat wreck in thePoultney
River in 1982.
Acknowledgements. The 1995 expe-
dition to Whitehall is being spon-
sored by the Institute of Nautical Ar-
chaeology and the Lake Champlain
Maritime Museum, with additional
assistance from Texas A&M Univer-
sity, the University of Vermont, and
the Vermont Division for Historic
Preservation. The expenses of the
field study and archival research on
these ships are being partially sup-
ported by a 'Legacy Grant' from the
United States Navy and adminis-
tered through the Naval Historical
Center in Washington, D.C. Addi-
tional logistical support has been
provided by INA Director Harlan
Crow.
Suggested Reading
ican Brig on Lake Champlain During the War of 1812. Shelburne, Vt. and
he Champlain Valley. Syracuse, N.Y.
Forgotten Conflict. Urbana and Chicago.
Drawing: K. Crisman
Fig. 7: Lines for a U.S. Navy Two-Gun Row Galley, adapted from original plans in the U.S. Archives. Macdonough's Lake Champlain
squadron had six gunboats of this type.
INA Quarterly 22.1
M'/d' &6pfm s :0"
d/ 4..0 ^/ ..J
/O/ // / /J
I. DOflyA
ROW GALLEY
Albania's Adriatic Coast:
An Unexplored Region of the Mediterranean
by Elizabeth Greene and Peter G. van Alfen, INA Research Associates
On a winter night four years ago, a
student revolution brought commu-
nism in Albania to a bloodless end.
During its nearly 50 years under the
leadership of Enver Hoxha, Albania
effectively withdrew from the inter-
national community. As the country
strives for economic and political re-...
birth, the new government has
opened its long shut borders to for-
eigners, revealing a spectacular land. ".
Rugged mountains loom over idyl-
lic fields and farms and, along much
of the coastline, over the Adriatic Sea.
For shipwreck discoveries, this rocky .o..
coast remains the last region in ,N
Europe's Mediterranean to be ex-
plored. ..
Archaeology received significant
attention and support from the
former communist government. To
date, however, all survey and exca-
vation has focused on the numerous
land sites in the country. Realizing
the potential of their underwater re-
sources, a representative from
Albania's Instituti Arkeologjise wrote Fig. 1: Ma
to Dr. George Bass early last year
about the possibility of conducting a collaborative venture.
Only a few months later, Bass, INA Director Claude
Duthuit, and the authors visited Tirana and met with Al-
banian archaeologists to discuss such a project.
rp
Photo: P. van Alfen
Fig. 2: Medieval ruins overlook the Adriatic Sea along the coast of
southern Albania, near Himara.
At the Instituti Arkeologjise, we
spoke with Dr. Namik Bodinaku, Dr.
Neritan Ceka, and Mr. Rezart Spahia,
an archaeologist who hopes to be-
come Albania's first nautical special-
ist. After a tour of the Archaeologi-
cal Museum, Spahia took us to sev-
eral of Albania's ancient ports and
harbors (fig. 1). We saw Lezha and
Durres, where fishermen informed
us that they had netted amphoras in
numerous spots along the southern
coast (fig. 2). Archaeologists and fish-
ermen alike expressed their concern
that the recent influx of foreign plea-
sure craft into Albanian waters has
led to the first systematic looting of
underwater sites; they stressed their
desire to inventory and excavate key
wrecks in the near future. Albania's
nautical heritage presents an exciting
new opportunity to INA for impor-
tant shipwreck discoveries.
S History
Map: P. van Alfen Albania's coast has long provided
of Albania access to the shortest crossing be-
tween Greece and Italy. As early as
the Bronze Age, sailing craft traversed these waters from
east to west. The coast and interior were originally occu-
pied by the Illyrians, a tribe noted for their seafaring and
piracy. Bronze Age seafaring in the Adriatic is represented
by imported material discovered throughout Albania.
Minoan, Mycenaean and possibly Phoenician imports of
pottery and bronzes have been found in the coastal region.
Numerous Mycenaean finds in Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia
may suggest that the Bronze Age Greeks concentrated their
trade and exploration in the west because of Phoenician
or Minoan activity in the east.
During their colonization period between 800 and 500
B.C., Greeks moved west to Italy as well as north to
Dalmatia. These valuable regions provided silver, tin and
grain, as well as slaves, pitch, wax, honey, cheese, cattle
and hides. Illyria itself yielded abundant timber and sil-
ver, while Baltic amber was probably brought to Greece
by way of the Adriatic. For movement in both directions,
strongholds on the Albanian coast were vital. Strabo (6.2.4)
records the Corinthian expulsion of Illyrian tribes from
Corcyra (modern Corfu) around 734 B.C. and its forma-
tion as a Greek colony.
INA Quarterly 22.1
Fig. 3: Design of an Illyrian vessel incised on bronze greaves from
Clasinac dating to the 7th century B.C. Boats such as these may
have been used in early seafaring or raiding ventures. Drawing
after J. Wilkes, The Illyrians (1992) 44.
In their establishment of early colonies, the Greeks
generally did not conquer the native Illyrians, but chose to
live among them. Only a few major Greek colonies were
established in modern-day Albania. A joint expedition be-
tween Corinth and Corcyra led to the foundation of
Epidamnus (modern Durres) in 627 B.C., while Apollonia's
colonization in 588 B.C. brought the short crossing to south-
ern Italy under Greek control. In the second half of the
fifth century a fleet of Corinthian ships was destroyed by
the Corcyreans in their struggle for control over Epidamnus
and its trade monopoly with Illyria (fig. 3).
Strengthened by the flourishing commerce in their
lands and their position as a gateway between the east and
west, the llyrians became renowned as pirates and raid-
ers in later Greek and Roman times. Strabo (7.5.10) com-
ments on the dearth of Greek colonies in the region and
notes that although the Illyrian seaboard was well sup-
plied with harbors, "people in earlier times made but small
account of it- perhaps in part owing to their ignorance of
its fertility, though mostly because of the wildness of the
inhabitants and their piratical habits." The famous Illyrian
liburni and lembi, light, swift vessels, were ideal for piracy.
Illyrian interference with the profitable commerce between
Greece and Italy brought Roman forces across the Adriatic
for the first time. In 229 B.C. the Romans invaded Illyria,
ending the native Queen Teuta's piratical policies and forc-
ing her to abandon Corcyra and Epidamnus. Fifty-four
lembi were seized by the Romans in a sea battle off the coast
of Epidamnus. By 167 B.C. the Romans had conquered
Illyria.
The land prospered during the Roman period with
wealthy port towns and scholarly institutions attended by
future Roman emperors and statesmen (fig. 4). Cicero
praised Apollonia as a "grand and noble city" and fre-
quently visited Buthrotum (modern Butrint) where his
friend, Atticus, had constructed a magnificent villa, the
Amaltheion. Additionally, the Romans paved the Via
Egnatia, which linked the Adriatic ports with Byzantium
and the East, a route established in Neolithic times. Dur-
ing the Roman civil wars, possession of Albania's coast
was fiercely contested because of its commercial and stra-
tegic importance. Julius Caesar established a major coastal
station at Buthrotum from which he repelled Pompey's
advances; scores of warships were lost in the battles.
Later, the division of the Roman Empire left Albania
in the hands of the Byzantines, where it lay as the western
boundary of the Eastern Empire. Along the Albanian coast
stand some of the most important and best preserved Byz-
antine monuments in the Mediterranean region; these at-
test to the special attention Albania received from eastern
emperors, several of whom were born there. For centu-
ries the Byzantines wrestled with the Venetians and oth-
ers for control of this valuable coast. In A.D. 1081 even the
Normans, under Robert Guiscard, attempted a major in-
vasion and lost an entire fleet near Durres. Later, Durres
became a crucial port for both Crusader knights en route to
the Holy Land and Venetian commercial enterprises. When
the Ottoman Turks seized Albania in 1446, they closed the
coast to the west and allowed the ports and cities to fall
into a state of decline that lasted until the modern era.
Geography of the Adriatic
Despite the importance of Albania's coast throughout
the ages, much has been written about the dangers of the
Adriatic Sea. The Roman poet Horace describes the emo-
tion of a scorned lover as "more wrathful than the wicked
Adriatic" (Odes iii.9.23). Such a reputation is not entirely
undeserved. Considered to be one of the most hazardous
bodies of water in the Mediterranean region, the Adriatic
Sea is subject to occasional fierce gales. These winds are
sometimes mentioned to explain the "failure" of the Greeks
rnoto: van ALten
Fig. 4: Remains of a Roman theater at Butrint testify to the flour-
ishing culture in Albania's coastal towns.
INA Quarterly 22.1
to fully colonize the area, but their influence should not be
exaggerated, as it is clear that Creek, Roman, and Byzan-
tine sailors took full advantage of the Adriatic passage.
Winter squalls from the Bora, a stormy northeast wind,
and the southwest Siffanto contribute to the reputation of
the Adriatic as a hazardous region for sailing. During sum-
mer and autumn, however, Scirocco breezes from the
southeast facilitate crossings from the Albanian coast to
Italy, while the northwest Maestrale and evening westerly
breezes allow an easy return. As ancient seafarers gener-
ally confined their sailing to seasons of favorable weather,
stormy winter seas should not have presented an insur-
mountable problem. Records of shipwrecks along
Albania's coasts are frequent, however, in historical sources
from numerous periods, while inscriptions and carvings
on coastal cliffs bear direct witness to the presence of
stranded sailors (fig. 5).
Shipwreck Survey in Albania
Although Albania is a small country its roughly 200
miles of coastline present endless possibilities for ship-
wreck discovery: from Mycenaean cargo vessels, to Illyrian
and Roman warships, to Norman cavalry transports. De-
spite Albania's prominence along the sea routes of antiq-
uity, a recent catalogue of known shipwrecks in the Medi-
terranean does not place a single wreck in Albanian wa-
ters. In Greece, shipwrecks have been found as far north
as Corfu, directly across from the southern border of Al-
bania. North of Albania, over 100 known shipwrecks line
the Dalmatian coast. Only for lack of searching have no
wrecks been recorded along the Albanian coast.
In our initial plans to investigate the region, we dis-
cussed the prospect of working with the Albanian Instituti
Arkeologjise to conduct a coastal survey in the summer of
1996. Recent conversations with INA Adjunct Professor
John Gifford of the Rosenstiel School of Marine and At-
mospheric Sciences (RSMAS) at the University of Miami
may allow us to realize a survey even sooner than we had
expected. As.part of a collaboration that would combine
INA's nautical archaeological expertise with RSMAS's high
technology marine survey systems and qualified Albanian
archaeologists, former INA Director Sumner Gerard has
offered to provide a research vessel and equipment for a
survey this summer. To help lay the groundwork for this
survey and to reconnoiter survey locations, one of the au-
thors, Peter van Alfen, returned to Albania in January.
Elizabeth Greene has applied for a Fulbright grant to spend
the upcoming academic year in Tirana planning for future
survey and excavation.
The Institute of Nautical Archaeology's dedication to
the exploration, protection, and preservation of the world's
maritime cultural heritage has resulted in shipwreck sur-
veys and excavations, support for newly established mu-
seums of underwater archaeology, and training for nauti-
rnoo: ; apama
Fig. 5: Ships carved into the rocky cliffs along Albania's coast sug-
gest the presence of shipwrecked sailors.
cal archaeologists throughout the world. As we begin the
search for Illyria's long lost shipwrecks with our Albanian
colleagues, we look forward to decades of new discover-
ies and nautical archaeological research on par with INA's
accomplishments in Turkey, Egypt, Jamaica, and the United
States.
In Tirana last August, during our final night at the
Arberia Hotel, George Bass and Claude Duthuit waxed
nostalgic, "This is just like Turkey 30 years ago. There is
so much potential here." We will certainly find out-
Albania's waters remain virgin territory for exploration
and discovery.
Acknowledgements. Several individuals and institutions
have provided assistance and support for our goal to work
in Albania. Dr. Namik Bodinaku, Dr. Neritan Ceka, Dr.
Faik Drini, and Rezart Spahia of the Instituti Arkeologjise
have our most grateful thanks. In Albania, we would also
like to thank Sitki and Gjeraqina Spahia, and Genzi
Manastirlliu. George Bass and Claude Duthuit's support
and cheerful company lastAugust were truly appreciated.
The MSC L.T. Jordan Institute at Texas A&M University
provided funding for Mr. van Alfen's trip to Albania in
January. Funds from INA and a travel grant from the Nau-
tical Archaeology Program at Texas A&M University made
possible the authors' recent visit to the Rosenstiel School
in Miami, where John Gifford and Sumner Gerard hosted
a meeting with Albanian archaeologists.
Suggested Reading
Dell, H.
1967 "The Origin and Nature of Illyrian Piracy"
Historia 16: 344-58.
Hammond, N.
1967 Epirus, Oxford.
Wilkes, J.
1992 The Illyrians, Oxford.
INA Quarterly 22.1
A Ninth-Century Shipwreck near Bozburun, Turkey
by Frederick M. Hocker, Sara W. and George 0. Yamini Faculty Fellow
Fig. 1: Map of the Mediterranean c. AD. 925 showing the extent
r
E
/
ttf
A
Of
Byzantine Empire.
In the year 827, Moslem raiders attacked two islands con-
trolled by the Byzantine Empire. Each was of great strate-
gic significance. Sicily commanded the passage between
the eastern and western Mediterranean and protected the
Byzantine lands of southern Italy, while Crete guarded the
mouth of the Aegean, the main route to the heart of the
Empire. In Sicily, the raiders of 827 represented the first
wave of many engaged in a slow conquest of the island.
The Byzantine defenders fought doggedly for over a cen-
tury, but eventually lost. From their new Sicilian strong-
hold, Fatimid marauders attacked Italy and harried the
Tyrrhenian coast. Crete, by contrast, proved to be an easier
target. Poorly fortified and defended, it fell into Moslem
hands within a decade. Spanish Moslems fortified the is-
land, and for approximately 130 years posed a constant
threat to Byzantine shipping. The Byzantines mounted
several expeditions to recapture the island, but could not
evict the Arabs until 961.
The capture of Crete and most of Sicily, along with the
establishment of forward bases in sou them France, defined
the high water mark of Moslem sea power in the medi-
eval Mediterranean. From Baghdad, the Abbasid Caliphs
ruled a realm that stretched from the Indian Ocean to the
Atlantic and presided over a court famous for its sophisti-
cation and scholarship. Only Italy, Greece, the Balkans,
and Asia Minor remained in Christian hands, and the Byz-
antine navy, which had once sailed unchallenged from
Syria to Spain, was confined to the Aegean, the Adriatic,
and a strip of the Mediterranean coast of Asia Minor.
Paradoxically, the ninth century also marked the re-
cover of the Mediterranean
economy from a two-century de-
pression that followed the Arab
conquest of Syria and Egypt and
Black Sea the beginning of the medieval
Byzantine "Golden Age." With
SMediterranean options curtailed,
the emperors in Constantinople
WMPRE looked northward, to the Balkan
lands lost to the Bulgars in the
eighth century. In a series of cam-
o*,,,x. paigns after mid-century, Byzan-
tine armies recovered the fertile
plains of Thrace and pushed the
BBASTD CALIPHATE frontier back to the Danube. At
Map: E Hocker the same time, the Caliphs in
territory controlled by the Baghdad began to feel pressure
from regional challenges toward
their authority and intra-dynas-
tic struggle, allowing the Byzantine emperors to reconquer
the parts of eastern Asia Minor lost in the previous two
centuries and even to contest Syria (fig. 1).
In this period, when the balance of power in the east-
ern Mediterranean was shifting and the foundations of the
economic explosion of the end of the millennium were
being laid, maritime trade also began to recover. For the
Byzantines, ships were essential to commerce and com-
munication between the core provinces of Greece and Asia
Map: D. Stewart
Fig. 2: The 9th-century shipwreck is located off the southwest coast
of Turkey near the town of Selimiye.
INA Quarterly 22.1
Minor, despite the threat of Cretan pirates.
Seafaring proved vital for maintaining
links to more distant outposts in the
Adriatic and Black Seas, and for supply-
ing the beleaguered defenders of Sicily. In
the Arab world, which stretched along the
African coast from Alexandria to Gibraltar
and included Spain and the Levant, a lively
long-distance trade is evidenced by histori-
cal documents. Ships traveled from one
end of the Mediterranean to the other, and
the periodic wars with the Byzantines ap-
parently failed to halt trade between Mos-
lems and Christians.
The ninth century is unusually poorly
represented in the archaeology of the east-
ern Mediterranean. There are virtually no
properly excavated sites from the period.
In a recently published catalogue of ship-
wreck sites, out of over 1,200 wrecks
known in the Mediterranean from before
1500, only a dozen are assigned to the pe- Fig. 3 (left): A
riod between 750 and 1000. None of these Bozburun wreck
has been fully excavated, and the three par- Fig. 4 (right):
tially excavated sites are all in French wa-
ters at the other end of the Mediterranean.
In Turkish waters, the seventh-century wreck at Yassiada
and the eleventh-century wreck at Serge Limaru provide
important snapshots of trade and technology in the eras
flanking the ninth century. From these, it is clear that ma-
jor changes in shipbuilding, seafaring, commerce, and the
basic economic underpinnings of society were under way,
but the gap between the seventh and eleventh centuries
remains wide in a time of drastic change.
The Discovery of a Ninth-Century Shipwreck
In 1973, during the first INA (then AINA) survey for
shipwrecks in Turkish waters, local sponge divers showed
the INA team, led by George Bass, a wreck on the south-
western corner of the Turkish coast (fig. 2). At a depth of
26 to 37 m, on a sandy slope at the base of a nearly vertical
cliff, lay a pile of amphoras 20 m long and 8 m wide (fig.
3). One of the intact amphoras was recovered and dated
to the ninth century A.D. by the late Virginia Grace. Fur-
ther research has identified the best parallels for these am-
phoras on late ninth-century kiln sites in the Crimea. The
importance of the site, near the town of Bozburun, was
immediately apparent, but it was only one of many sites
discovered on that first Turkish survey (see AINA News-
letter 1.1: 3). In following years, INA excavated a Middle
Bronze Age cargo at Sheytan Deresi, the eleventh-century
Glass Wreck and a Hellenistic wreck at Serce Limanm.
INA returned to Bozburun in 1982 to survey the ninth-
century wreck in preparation for a full scale excavation.
Photos: D. Frey
mound of amphoras 20m long and 8m wide marks the location of the
k.
The shipwreck may contain over 1,000 amphoras of this type.
The survey team recovered another amphora, with graf-
fiti on its shoulder, and spoke with a local sponge fisher-
man, who told them that the site had been known for some
time. In addition to raising an amphora, the team photo-
graphed the site extensively in order to construct a
photomosaic and excavated two test pits to evaluate the
state of preservation of any hull remains beneath the am-
phoras.
Although the Bozburun wreck was slated for excava-
tion following the survey, other events intervened. In 1982,
a sponge diver named Mehmet Cakir reported the discov-
ery of metal "biscuits with ears" at Uluburun, near Kas. It
proved to be the Late Bronze Age wreck that captured the
attention of specialists and the public alike, and was re-
cently excavated in 11 seasons of dedicated work by INA
staff under the direction of George Bass and Cemal Pulak.
In 1992, as the Uluburun excavation began to draw to
a close, thoughts returned to Bozburun. The site was in-
spected during the 1992 survey and again in June of 1994
in anticipation of commencing excavation in 1995. The
purpose of this last brief, two-day survey was to familiar-
ize the core of the excavation team with the site and to
assess the logistical aspects of the project. A third amphora
was raised (fig. 4), and with the help of INA Director o
Danielle Feeney, a nearby island was scouted for potential
camp sites. The cliff face at the site is even more sheer
than that at Uluburun, with no possibility of attaching liv-
ing space for more than 20 people to it.
INA Quarterly 22.1
Potential for the Future
With the Uluburun excavation completed, INA has ap-
plied to the Turkish Ministry of Culture for a permit to
excavate the Bozburun shipwreck. Of the wrecks discov-
ered in Turkish waters, the Bozburun site fills the largest
gap in our knowledge of the history of seafaring, and illu-
minates one of the darkest periods in Mediterranean ar-
chaeology in general. This project also offers the opportu-
nity to test some new methods of mapping and informa-
tion management. Planning for the excavation is already
under way, based on the information obtained in the sur-
veys of 1973 through 1994, and on the questions raised by
the analysis of the Yassiada and Serqe Limaru shipwrecks.
Because the site lies at the base of a cliff and is exposed
to winds from the northwest, it is not practical to use INA's
research vessel Virazon as a primary dive platform. In-
stead, a fixed platform built onto the rocks will offer a much
safer and more reliable base for diving operations. Divers
can work on surface-supplied air (hookah), entering and
exiting the water is both easier and safer, and the Virazon
can be freed to pursue further surveys.
The best site for the camp and work areas is Sig Bay
(Shallow Bay), near the town of Selimiye, one-half nauti-
cal mile from the site (fig. 5). Sig Bay is protected from
winds and swells and contains a flat, sandy beach. It can
be reached overland from Selimiye in less than 10 min-
utes, and piped village water and electricity can be brought
right down to the beach. In addition, there is enough space
to provide work and storage areas as well as living and
dining accommodations. The extra space will be put to
good use. By involving a large number of archaeology
students from Texas A&M, Istanbul, and Bilkent Univer-
sities, it will be possible to accomplish some of the initial
conservation of the finds in the field. Gross cleaning of
amphoras will not only reduce the post-excavation con-
-lIUU; n Kl ricy
Fig. 5: Camp will be set up at the head of the small bay in the fore-
ground. The town of Selimiye surrounds the larger bay.
servation burden, but will allow the excavation staff to
begin cataloguing the finds for study.
New methods of information management will also
contribute to an efficient and rapid completion of the ex-
cavation. Since 1985, INA projects have been using data-
base and CAD (computer-aided drafting) technology to
streamline data management. Over the past year, a team
of Texas A&M graduate students has been developing an
improved, integrated system for managing the wealth of
information produced in excavation. The basis of this sys-
tem is a computer-aided mapping method developed by
the excavators of Henry VIII's flagship Mary Rose. This
method, called Direct Survey Measurement (DSM), com-
bines the underwater reliability of tape measures and cam-
eras with the calculating advantages of computers to pro-
duce an accurate map with a minimum of underwater ef-
fort. The map can then be combined with artifact data-
base catalogues to produce an interactive, three-dimen-
sional record of the site.
The data management system is designed to facilitate
post-excavation research and contribute directly to an elec-
tronic, multi-media publication that combines the tradi-
tional elements of an excavation report, catalogues and
analysis of different groups of finds, with the ability to view
the site three-dimensionally, review video footage of the
excavation, and order the data in any way desired. This
sort of publication will be useful to both the specialist and
the general public. With the Bozburun excavation, INA
will take the next step into the future of our field. New
technology will allow us to bring nautical archaeology to
an even wider audience, and to relate our findings more
clearly to the work of historians and land archaeologists.
Acknowledgements. Although approval of the excavation
permit from the Turkish Ministry of Culture and General
Directorate of Antiquities is still pending, provisional fi-
nancial and in-kind support for the project has been re-
ceived from the National Endowment for the Humanities,
the International Diving Educators Association, and the
diving equipment manufacturer MARES, a division of
HTM Sport, S.p.A.
Suggested Reading
Bass, G.E
1974 Discovery 73. AINA Newsletter 1.1: 1-4.
Lewis, A.R., and T.J. Runyan
1985 European Naval and Maritime History, 300-1500.
Bloomington, IN.
Ostrogorsky, G.
1969 History of the Byzantine State. New Brunswick,
NJ.
Treadgold, W.
1988 The Byzantine Revival 780-842. Stanford.
INA Quarterly 22.1
The Canary Islands Shipwreck Survey
by Brett A. Phaneuf, INA Research Associate, and Peter W. Hitchcock
The Canary Islands, volcanic peaks located between 28 and
30 degrees north latitude, approximately 100 km from the
western coast of Morocco, have a seafaring tradition that
dates back thousands of years. The islands were known
to the Romans by the first century B.C., and possibly to
Phoenician merchants trading along the west coast of Af-
rica as early as the seventh century B.C. In the medieval
and post-medieval periods, the-Canaries served as a ma-
jor center for trade of slaves and luxury goods between
Africa and Europe, and ultimately became the final provi-
sioning point for ships crossing the Atlantic to the New
World. Comprised of seven major islands and many small,
rocky islets (fig. 1), the Canary archipelago provides little
sea floor accessible to scuba divers, so its underwater cul-
tural resources remain virtually untouched. The islands,
therefore, provide a unique research opportunity that has
the potential to expand significantly our knowledge of sea-
faring in the region over the past three millennia.
SN
MADEIRA ISLANDS
SALVAGES ..
CANARY F,
ISLANDS
The authors, along with recent Texas A&M Nautical
Archaeology Program graduate Sam Turner, visited the
Canary Islands at the end of last July, anxious to make pre-
liminary contacts and begin planning a survey for ancient
shipwrecks along the coast of Lanzarote, the easternmost
isle of the Canary archipelago. Excited by the prospect of
discovering an ancient shipwreck outside the Straits of
Gibraltar, months before our departure we had begun a
correspondence with several individuals in the Canaries.
Upon our arrival in Tenerife, we contacted Gabriel
Escribano Cobo and Alfredo Mederos Martin at the Univer-
sidad de La Laguna. Both are doctoral candidates at the
university, studying prehispanic contact with the Canary
Islands and chalcolithic archaeology, respectively. Initially,
we were disheartened to hear from them that the areas we
had outlined as potential research sites had been placed
under the protection of the Canary Islands government
and that a survey would not be possible at that time.
Our moods lightened the following morning when
Escribano and Martin took us to meet the director of the
Department of Anthropology, Archaeology and Ancient
History, Professor Martin Socas, and Professor Antonio
Tejera Gaspar. Here we learned that the Spanish govern-
ment, in conjunction with two universities on the main-
land and the Universidad de La Laguna, intends to con-
duct an underwater survey in El Rio and the waters around
Lanzarote in the fall of 1995. This will be the first season
of a three-year project to investigate potential underwater
archaeological sites throughout the Canary Islands. We
were invited to return and participate.
History and Research Potential
Classical authors often referred to islands in "the outer
sea" (the Atlantic) as the Isles of the Blest or the Fortunate
Islands, the mythical site of the Elysian Fields, final rest-
ing place of those who lived a virtuous life. Although an-
cient references to islands along the Moroccan coast may
occur in the texts of Homer, the first specific mention of
the Canary Islands comes from the Roman author Pliny
the Elder. His Natural History, written in the first century
B.C., contains an account of how the islands received their
name. According to Pliny, King Juba II of Mauretania dis-
patched an exploratory force to the southwest of his land.
King Juba's troops returned to Mauretania with two dogs
(canis in Latin) from the Canary Islands and reported that
these were the largest animals to be found. Juba's explor-
ers also reported traces of human occupation, but no
people.
INA Quarterly 22.1
Map: P. Hitchcock
Fig. 1: The Canary archipelago consists of seven major islands off
the coast of Morocco.
_
:
::::
';""".\-
::i::
:
` :i'''";
I ' ~1
- "~
;:L . :::::1
"is,~,,~~.:~c-;t
6:~~c-\;i~;l.~,~;.
~,idl~~~:?
I'
.:
:
:: .:r:-
E~-'
Drawings: K. Bowling
Roman through post-medieval activity in the Canary Islands is
supported by these amphoras. Fig. 2 (left), similar to amphoras
manufactured along the north coast of Algeria, may have carried
wine, while fig. 3 (center) may have been used for olive oil. Am-
phoras like those depicted in fig. 4 (right) were used during the
14th through 18th centuries to transport wine and vinegar through-
out the Mediterranean.
Who were the mysterious inhabitants of the islands?
It is a common myth that the Canaries were populated by
Moroccan Berber tribes exiled from Africa by the Romans.
In actuality, the islands were inhabited long before the
Roman period. Fuerteventura, one of the eastern Canary
Islands, is visible from the Moroccan coast if the weather
is clear. Thus, the existence of the islands would have been
known to ancient peoples in this part of Africa. The first
settlers in the Canaries were probably African peoples who
traveled to the islands using exceptionally large dugout
canoes. Such canoes are common finds in coastal sites in
Sub-Saharan Africa and along the Riffian coast, just inside
the Straits of Gibraltar. Libyo-Berber script rock carvings,
similar to those found throughout north Africa, are present
on almost all of the Canary Islands, providing additional
evidence of ancient African visits to the islands.
Archaeological evidence for Roman presence in the Ca-
naries has also been discovered. In the mid 1960s, divers
discovered amphoras in El Rio, along the east coast of
Lanzarote, in Gran Canaria near Las Palmas, and on the
east coast of Tenerife. Photographs of three of these jars
have been published, including two Roman vessels. The
Roman amphoras were manufactured in two locations: the
north coast of Algeria (fig. 2) and Tunisia (fig. 3). Both
types date between the second and fourth centuries A.D.
and are common throughout the Mediterranean; find spots
include the east Spanish coast, Ostia, and Athens.
To date, no terrestrial Roman sites have been discov-
ered in the Canary Islands, and itis doubtful that the pres-
ence of these amphoras indicates a direct trade between
the Mediterranean and the indigenous islanders. A pos-
sible explanation for the presence of the amphoras in the
Canaries is that a ship from Mogador, about 500 km to the
north on the Moroccan coast, was caught in a storm and
drifted with the Canary Current south to the islands where
it wrecked. Mogador was one of many Phoenician or later
Roman cities on the Atlantic coast of Morocco which pro-
duced murex dye, olive oil, wine, and garum. The Canary
Islands undoubtably would have been known to sailors
traveling south of Mogador.
In addition to ancient material, medieval and post-
medieval artifacts are commonly found in the Canaries.
Small transport jars were used to carry wine and vinegar
throughout the Mediterranean and along the north coast
of Europe between the fourteenth and eighteenth centu-
ries (fig. 4). Similar small jars are frequently found in the
Caribbean and even as far afield as Maine. The study of
these vessels may provide valuable evidence about the de-
veloping economy of late Medieval Europe and the bur-
geoning New World.
As we traveled throughout the lush north side of
Tenerife, we noticed an abundance of ships' guns and an-
chors incorporated into the small parks of many cities and
towns (fig. 5). On closer inspection, it became apparent
that quite a few of these cannon had spent some time un-
der water. Turner was esctatic; he had just finished his
master's thesis about ships' guns from the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. The Canary Islands were a gold mine
to him, providing a tangible connection between the New
and Old Worlds. In addition to the many cannon, one of
which is credited with separating Admiral Nelson from
his arm, we saw a plethora of anchors, one possibly recov-
ered from a ship of Admiral Nelson's fleet, lost off Tenerife
in 1797.
INA Quarterly 22.1
I.
The 1995 Survey
The authors and Sam Turner will return
to the Canaries in September for the first year
of a survey project designed to evaluate
known post-medieval underwater sites and
discover new evidence of maritime activity
from the ancient and medieval periods. The
INA team will join underwater archaeologists
from three universities in Spain, including
Escribano Cobo of the Universidad de La La-
guna, author of La Arqueologia Submarina en
Tenerife. We will spend the first two months
of the survey aboard a Spanish research ves-
sel whose equipment includes'an ROV and a
full array of remote sensing equipment. After
two months of data collection and site map-
ping, two additional months will be spent pro-
cessing the information at the Universidad de
La Laguna. The impressive research facilities Fig. 5: Lati
at the university contain state of the art com- on the north
puter resources, photographic equipment,
scanning electron microscopes, a conservation laboratory
and a comprehensive library (fig. 6).
As a result of this excursion to the Canary Islands, INA
has been invited to enter into a cooperative agreement with
the Universidad de La Laguna to promote underwater ar-
chaeology and the exchange of information between the
two institutions. This agreement will provide a unique
opportunity for graduate students in the Texas A&M Nau-
tical Archaeology Program and INA staff to combine the
interests of New and Old World archaeology. We are anx-
iously looking forward to our return to the islands to be-
r. --
rioto: b. rnaneur
e seventeenth- or early eighteenth-century cannon found at Garachico
west coast of Tenerife.
gin the survey project. We are hopeful that our efforts will
lay the foundation for a long and productive collabora-
tion with Spanish archaeologists and universities.
Acknowledgements. Our initial success is due in large part
to the Leyland T. Jordan Institute for International Aware-
ness at Texas A&M University for providing the funding
necessary to make the trip possible. We would also like to
thank the following: longtime INA members David and
Ruth Slade of the Canary Islands for being generous and
gracious hosts, and Gabriel Escribano Cobo and Alfredo
Mederos Martin for donating their own time to meet with
us and show us Tenerife. Thanks also to Pelican Products
for providing underwater lighting equipment for the up-
coming survey, and to Epson America for providing a note-
book computer to record data. Special thanks go to Eliza-
beth Lyding Will and George Bass for encouraging and
inspiring us to pursue our interests in the Canary Islands.
Suggested Reading
Escribano, G.
1995 La Arqueologia Submarina en Tenerife. La
Laguna, Canary Islands.
Hooten, E.
1925
Photo: B. Phaneuf
Fig. 6: The Universidad de La Laguna boasts a comprehensive li-
brary in which INA researchers will spend two months conducting
research following the survey.
The Ancient Inhabitants of the Canary Islands.
Harvard African Studies, vol. VII, Cambridge,
Mass.
Mercer, J.
1980 The Canary Islanders, Their Prehistory,
Conquest, and Survival. London.
Perera, A.C.
1988 Las Islas Canarias en el Mundo Clasico. Las
Palmas, Canary Islands.
INA Quarterly 22.1
News & Notes
Egyptian Obelisk Barge Experiment
The granite quarries of Aswan, Egypt,
have furnished stone for expensive con-
struction projects for nearly 5,000 years,
In December, 1994, the public television
program NOVA brought a diverse group
to Aswan to explore ways the Egyptians
might have created and moved obelisks,
using technology and materials we know
they possessed. INA-Egypt director
Cheryl Haldane joined pyramid cons truc-
tion expert Mark Lehner of the ULliver-
sity of Chicago, stonemason Roger
Hopkins, and sculptor/engineer Martin
Isler at the Nile's edge for a week of ex-
perimental archaeology.
The ancient Egyptians moved
granite obelisks weighing as much as
400 tons from quarries to freight boats
and floated them down the Nile, but
left few clues about the technology
they used to do it. When asked to de-
vise a workable plan for a much
smaller obelisk (only 25 m long and
weighing only two tons), I first con-
sidered what we know about ancient
Egyptian barges. Designed to carry
deck loads, these boats had heavy
transverse timbers (including both
frames and beams) to spread the load
across the hull. Inscriptions suggest
that transport boats were about three
times longer than wide. They also
needed enough deck space for an obe-
lisk to be maneuvered on and off the
boat. The most famous obelisk barges,
carved in stone at Queen Hatshepsut's
funeral temple, illustrate another im-
portant feature: the hogging truss, de-
signed to prevent the ends of the boat
from sagging.
Modern Egyptian feluccas (sailing
boats for passengers and cargo) have
the broad, low hull characteristics of
ancient river boats, but are built to
carry cargo in the hold. The first task,
then, was to build a "pharaonic fe-
lucca" by adding beams, decking,
stanchions and an imitation hogging
truss to an existing hull. The method
of loading that I chose to explore was
one suggested about 70 years ago by
Somers Clarke: burying the boat to
deck level behind a coffer dam cut into
the river bank. This created a stable
platform for hauling the obelisk over
the stern and onto the vessel
When the coffer dam was cut,
water flooded into the slip. As the
water level rose, stocks we had added
Photo: Mark Lehner
Cheryl Haldane aboard an obelisk-carrying "pharaonic felucca"
to stabilize the boat floated away and
the boat began to move. Although we
ultimately had to rely on a bulldozer
to pull the "pharaonic felucca" from its
muddy slip (the water table was too
high at our location), it was clear that
the method was fairly simple and
made use of known ancient technol-
ogy and the mechanical advantage
offered by water. The stability of the
hull was impressive and I had time to
appreciate it as I drifted in a small la-
goon with the obelisk while waiting
to be towed back to shore.
-Cheryl Haldane
The second edition of INA-Egypt's El
Bahri (of the Sea) is now available by
request to INA members. Please con-
tact Cheryl Haldane c/o INA, P.O.
Drawer HG, College Station, TX 77841.
Danish Nautical Archaeologists
Visit Texas A&M University
Ole Crumlin-Pedersen and Jan Bill of
the Center for Maritime Archaeology
of the Danish National Museum in
Roskilde, Denmark visited INA and
the Nautical Archaeology Department
at Texas A&M University from 30
January to 5 February, 1995. Mr.
Crumlin-Pedersen, a pioneer of nau-
tical archaeology, is the director of the
Center, newly established in 1993 with
an initial grant of 40 million Danish
kroner ($7 million). The Danish nau-
tical archaeologists were interested in
how INA and the Nautical Archaeol-
ogy Program operate, and spent the
week talking to faculty, staff, and stu-
dents. Mr. Bill gave a lecture on his
work with medieval ferries connect-
ing southern Denmark with Germany,
and Mr. Crumlin-Pederson spoke
about the religious symbolism of boats
in pre-Viking Nordic culture, based on
excavations of the cemetery at
SlusegArd.
INA and the Center are currently
pursuing closer ties. Fred Hocker re-
cently returned from a month as a vis-
iting professor at the Center in Den-
mark, where he studied flexibility and
hull integrity in Viking ships.
INA Quarterly 22.1
Jordan Fellowships Awarded
Nautical Archaeology Program gradu-
ate students were honored with three
of ten Leyland T. Jordan Fellowships
awarded by the Jordan Institute for In-
ternational Awareness at Texas A&M
University. Recipients include Layne
Hedrick, who will work with INA-
Egypt this summer on the excavation
of a seventeenth-century porcelain car-
rier in the Red Sea, David Johnson,
who travelled to Jamaica in December
to study records pertaining to slavery
and shipping in the seventeenth, eigh-
teenth, and nineteenth centuries, and
Peter van Alfen, who visited Albania
in January to perform a preliminary
reconnaissance of the coast in prepa-
ration for a survey there (see pp. 9-11
of this issue).
Seventh Symposium on Boat and Ship
Archaeology
The Seventh International Symposium
on Boat and Ship Archaeology was
held at tie Tahitou, France on July 19-
22, 1994. Tahitou is a small island
(about 67 acres) just off the Normandy
coast near Cherbourg. It has a long
military and maritime history which
includes serving as a fortress, fishing
port, marine laboratory, and its present
role as an educational center. Nearly
100 people attended the sessions,
tours, films, displays, and special
events, all of which were held on the
island. There were sessions on ancient
Mediterranean, Romano-Celtic, medi-
eval, and postmedieval ships, ship-
building, archaeology, and ethnogra-
phy. The symposium was especially
notable for the number of new water-
craft, projects, and ideas that were in-
troduced.
In addition to the formal sessions,
one day was set aside for sailing along
the Normandy coast in traditional sail-
ing vessels, visits to the fortifications
and the maritime museum, and dem-
onstrations in local watercraft con-
struction at the boatyard. The sym-
posium was jointly sponsored by the
Centre de la Recherche Scientifique,
Musee de la Marine, and Mus6e Mari-
time de l'ile Tahitou, all of whom did
an excellent job of overcoming the
complex logistics of coordinating
transportation to and from the island
and providing a program that was
enjoyable and rewarding.
INA and Texas A&M University
were represented by Fred Hocker, who
presented a paper titled "Beurtvaarten
beurtschepen: passenger transporta-
tion on the Zuiderzee in the seven-
teenth century" and by professor
emeritus Dick Steffy, who presented,
"Seldom discussed features of ancient
ship construction."
-J.R. Steffy
The Midway Dauntless Project
Texas A&M Nautical Archaeology Pro-
gram graduate students Richard K.
Wills and David Grant spent two
weeks in March, 1995, at the National
Museum of Naval Aviation in
Pensacola, Florida, documenting a
rare World War II era Douglas SBD-2
Dauntless dive-bomber. The project is
being conducted by the U.S. Naval
Historical Center under the supervi-
sion of INA Research Associate Dr.
Robert Neyland.
The well-preserved aircraft,
named Midway Madness, was recov-
ered from the bottom of Lake Michi-
gan 50 years after being lost during a
U.S. Navy carrier landing qualification
exercise. Before its assignment at Lake
Michigan, the aircraft was a member
of the pre-WWII USS Lexington (CV-
2) air group, was present at Ford Is-
land Naval Air Station during the
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, took
part in the Lae-Salamaua Raid (March
10th, 1942), and may be the only sur-
viving aircraft that participated in the
decisive Battle of Midway (June 4th-
6th, 1942), where it collected at least
219 holes in its airframe as a result of
battle damage. The project and sub-
sequent report are expected to help
develop new standards for the docu-
mentation and preservation of historic
aircraft recovered from marine envi-
ronments.
-R.K. Wills
The Sea of Galilee Boat
Shelley Wachsmann, Texas A&M
Meadows Assistant Professor of Bib-
lical Archaeology, has written a new
book, The Sea of Galilee Boat: An Extraor-
dinary 2000 Year Old Discovery. The
remarkable true story recounts the dis-
covery, excavation, preservation, and
restoration of a vessel from the first
century A.D. The boat may be of the
type on which the apostles of Jesus
Christ sailed, as recorded in the Gos-
pels. Wachsmann traces historical and
biblical texts to discover that the Sea
of Galilee, during the boat's past, was
the setting for one of the most tragic
massacres of the Jews- the Battle of
Migdal. During this sea battle, Roman
soldiers mercilessly slaughtered Jews
as they attempted to flee in boats like
this one, turning the Sea of Galilee into
a sea of crimson.
Wachsmann directed the excava-
tion of the Galilee Boat for the Israel
Department of Antiquities and Muse-
ums in 1986. His discussion of the
project, "Ancient Seafaring in the Sea
of Galilee" appeared in the INA News-
letter 18.3 (1991) 4-9, 12.
The Sea of Galilee Boat is currently
available from the Plenum Publishing
Corporation for $24.95 or to INA mem-
bers at a 25% discount.
INA Quarterly 22.1
INSTITUTE OF NAUTICAL ARCHAEOLOGY
OFFICERS ADMINISTRATION
George F. Bass, Archaeological Director
Gregory M. Cook, Treasurer
William L. Allen
RayM. Bowen
John H. Baird
George F. Bass
Edward O. Boshell, Jr.
Gregory M. Cook, Vice Chairman
Harlan Crow
Frank Darden
Claude Duthuit
Daniel Fallon
Danielle J. Feeney
Frederick M. Hocker, President
Rebecca H. Holloway, Secretary
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Donald G. Geddes III
Bengt 0. Jansson
Woodrow Jones, Jr.
Harry C. Kahn II
Michael L. Katzev
Jack W. Kelley, Chairman
Sally R. Lancaster
Norma S. Langworthy
Samuel J. LeFrak
Robert E. Lorton
Frederick R. Mayer
William A. McKenzie
Donald A. Frey, Vice President
Cemnal M. Pulak, Vice President
Alex C. Nason
Ray H. Siegfried II
Ayhan Sidmoglu
William T. Sturgis
Robert L. Walker
Lew O. Ward
Peter M. Way
Carry M. Weber
Martin A. Wilcox
Richard A. Williford
George O. Yamlnl
FACULTY
George F. Bass
George T. & Gladys H. Abell Professor of Nautical Archaeology/ Yamini Family Professor of Liberal Arts
Kevin J. Crisman, Assistant Professor
Donny L. Hamilton, Associate Professor
Frederick M. Hocker, Sara W. & George O. Yamini Faculty Fellow
J. Richard Steffy, Sara W. & George O. Yamini Professor of Nautical Archaeology, Emeritus
Frederick H. van Doorinck, Jr., Frederick R. Mayer Professor of Nautical Archaeology
Shelley Wachsmann, Meadows Assistant Professor of Biblical Archaeology
GRADUATE FELLOWS
Mr. and Mrs. Ray H. Siegfried II
Graduate Fellow,
Cemal M. Pulak
Mr. and Mrs. J. Brown Cook
Graduate Fellows:
Brian A. Jordan, Michael P. Scafuri
STAFF
Marion Degirmend
Helen Dewolf
Sheila D. Matthews, M.A.
Selma Oguz
Claire P. Peachey, M.A.
Robin C.M. Piercy
Cemal M. Pulak, M.S., M.A.
Sema Pulak, M.A.
C. Wayne Smith, Ph.D.
Tufan U. Turanli
Patricia A. Turner
Jane Pannell
COUNSEL
RESEARCH ASSOCIATES
Jeremy Green
Elizabeth Greene
Cheryl W. Haldane, Ph.D.
Douglas Haldane, M.A.
George Indruszewski
Margaret E. Leshikar-Denton, Ph.D.
Kathleen McLaughlin-Neyland, M.A.
John C. Neville
Robert S. Neyland, Ph.D.
Brett A. Phaneuf
Ralph K. Pedersen, M.A.
Donald Rosencrantz
Peter G. van Alien
ADJUNCT PROFESSORS
Cynthia J. Eiseman, Ph.D.
John A. Gifford, Ph.D.
Faith D. Hentschel, Ph.D.
Carolyn G. Koehler, Ph.D.
David I. Owen, Ph.D.
David C Switzer, Ph.D.
Gordon P. Watts, Jr., M.A.
James A. Goold
SUPPORTING INSTITUTIONS
Australian Institute of Maritime Archaeology
Boston University
Brown University
Bryn Mawr College
University of California, Berkeley
University of Cincinnati
Cornell University
Coming Museum of Glass
Department de Arqueol6gia Subacuatica de
la I.NA.H., Mexico
University of Maryland, Baltimore County
New York University, Institute of Fine Arts
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Partners for Livable Places
University Museum, University of
Pennsylvania
Shell of Turkey, Ltd.
Texas A&M Research Foundation
Texas A&M University
University of Texas, Austin
QUARTERLY EDITORS
Elizabeth Greene
David J. Stewart
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