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I
The INA Quarterly
Volume 27 No. 2/3 Summer/Fall 2000
3 Under the Erythraean Sea:
An Ancient Shipwreck in Eritrea MEMBERSHIP
Ralph K. Pedersen Institute of Nautical Archaeology
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30 News and Notes
On the cover: Amphoras from the shipwreck at Black Assarca Island, Eritrea, in their storage tank. Photo: R. K Peder-
sen
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Editor: Christine A. Powell
Under the Erythraean Sea:
An Ancient Shipwreck in Eritrea
Ralph K. Pedersen
"This island is cursed!" Nesreddin spat this invec-
tive while the other Eritreans quietly nodded. Indeed, it
seemed Nesreddin was right. Little had gone right for us
since we had landed on Assarca on February 3,1997. Rain,
high winds, and chilly temperatures had prevailed for
weeks. The nearly daily pounding by wind and rain left
little opportunity to pursue our goal: the excavation of the
ancient shipwreck lying just offshore. The storms typical-
ly lasted for four or five days, followed by a calm of two or
three days' duration. Compounding this were the daily
equipment problems caused by the damp and the wind-
blown sand that got into everything. Long periods of inac-
tivity shortened people's tempers, particularly those of
ones unaccustomed to "roughing it" in isolated-environ-
ments. Every day was a challenge. I had long ago realized
that each day the team remained on Assarca would be a
triumph. We had already been given thirty of them; twen-
ty-five remained.
We had come to this small desert island off the Eri-
trean coast to excavate a fifteen-hundred-year-old ship-
wreck (fig. 1). Like many shipwrecks of archaeological
import, it was located far from the nearest outpost of civi-
lization. Massawa, Eritrea's main port, lay thirty miles
across the sea. Inghel, a group of traditional villages, was
several miles away on the mainland at the tip of the Buri
Peninsula. Inghel had no shops, roads, cars, or telephones.
There was, however, a medical clinic. Aside from our
neighbors at Inghel, we were truly isolated. Our one link
to the world was our single-side-band radio hooked up to
a solar-charged car battery. This, however, enabled only
the most intermittent contact with Massawa.
Our wreck had settled in the shallow waters of the
Assarca Islands. The Assarcas consist of two islets. One,
surrounded by fine sandy beaches and overgrown with
trees, is called White Assarca. The other, surrounded by
jagged, black coral cliffs and barren but for cacti, is Black
Assarca. Guess which one we were on!
Black Assarca, our base, is little more than an ob-
struction to shipping. Essentially, it is nothing but a mas-
sive sand-covered coral head lying two meters above sea
level. Except for a sandy beach on its northern side, the
island is nearly featureless. A reef, never more than a meter
underwater, completely surrounds Black Assarca, form-
ing a barrier to landing. At low tide, the highest tops of the
coral protrude from the sea like pickets, as though defend-
ing the place from intrusion. The island is populated by only
goats and hand-sized spiders. The flora is limited to grass
and a large cactus species called euphorbia. These cacti pro-
vide a windbreak as the only natural shelter on the island.
Fig. 1. Eritrea. The location of the Assarca Islands is approxi-
mate,
It was some fifteen centuries ago that a ship met
disaster on the reef. The wreckage settled at the base of
the cliff, possibly remaining undisturbed until 1995. In that
year, a group of tourists decided the Assarcas would be a
good place for snorkeling. Sailing under the guidance of
Doi Malingri, an Italian yachtsman running tours for the
Eritrean Ministry of Marine Resources (MMR), their yacht
put in at the islands.
During their snorkeling adventure through the dear
water, the group noticed odd objects at the base of the reef
twenty-five feet below. Malingri investigated these artifacts,
which proved to be ceramics. He raised a sherd, containing
a neck and handles (fig. 2), that he turned over to the Minis-
try upon his return to Massawa. Malingri reported to the
MMR that there were many more sherds at the island. Shortly
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Drawing: R. K. Pedersen
Fig. 2. The sherd raised by Doi Malingri in early 1995.
after this, the sherd was shown to a visiting photographer
from the National Geographic Society. The photographer
suggested to the Eritrean authorities that, as the piece might
be ancient, they should contact Dr. George Bass at INA.
It was at this time that I was preparing for a fact-
finding trip to Eritrea. This was in response to an invita-
tion issued to INA in late 1993, by the then-existing Eritrean
Department of Culture. By May 1995, all arrangements had
been made for my trip. I was planning to merely shake
hands and see about the feasibility of conducting a ship-
wreck survey along the coast. A week before my flight to
Africa, I received a phone call from Dr. Bass. He informed
me that the Eritrean MMR had contacted him about a pos-
sible ancient shipwreck in their waters and they wanted
him to examine it. He informed the MMR that one of his
research associates was already heading their way to visit
the Department of Culture, which surprised the MMR of-
ficials. Two weeks later, I was in the Red Sea searching for
the shipwreck.
The Survey at Assarca 1995
On my arrival in Asmara, Eritrea's capital, I first
met with Zemede Tecle, Head of the Department of Cul-
ture. I informed him of Malingri's discovery and that the
Ministry of Marine Resources in Massawa was expecting
me to take a look at it. Zemede had not heard of an ancient
wreck being discovered off their coast. I promised to re-
port my findings to him. I then headed down to Massawa,
on the edge of the Red Sea.
Asmara lay nine thousand feet above sea level, and
the weather in mid-May was still cool. The coastal regions,
however, were already baking in the heat. The road to
Massawa snaked its way from Asmara down the edge of
the Ethiopian plateau to the desert along the sea. The
change in climate was impressive. It ran from greenery in
which baboons ran wild to an arid waste in a matter of
hours. The coastal desert was forbidding, with dry river-
beds the only evidence that rain ever fell here. Dust devils
reached high into the sky. These slender twisting cones
appeared to be pillars of smoke and I initially thought they
were from fires.
I arrived in Massawa by afternoon. The town is lo-
cated on two islands and part of the mainland. Its oldest
part is on the island of Batsli. Here, Turkish, Egyptian, and
Arabic architectures blend together in an exotic mix. The
city was still scarred from its battles in 1991 in the war of
independence. Bullet holes marred the walls, and spent
artillery shells lay half buried in the dust Shattered Sovi-
et-built tanks lay in ruins about the city. Many people had
died in Massawa during the battle for its liberation. More
died in a revenge bombing by Ethiopian MIGs after the
city had been won by the Eritreans. Despite the overall
"shot up" look of the place, the city was slowly being re-
paired. Feelings of euphoria and optimism were palpable
in Massawa as elsewhere in Eritrea. The Eritreans, after
all, were forming a new nation.
My contact at the MMR was Dr. J.C. "Chris" Hill-
man. An overseas Briton, he and his wife Sheila had spent
their lives in East Africa. Living in a small trailer that did
triple duty as home, office, and school for their two daugh-
ters, they were studying the marine life of Eritrea. Once in
the MMR offices, I met with officials who showed me the
sherd found by Malingri some months previously. Skepti-
cally, I had been expecting the pottery to be relatively
modern, perhaps a pot tossed from a nineteenth-century
ship. I was stunned to see what my hosts pulled from the
storage cabinet. It was the top of an amphora containing a
neck and both handles. I had spent over a year preparing
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
to do the groundwork for an archaeological survey in Eri-
trean waters. Instead, I was confronted with the real pos-
sibility of an ancient shipwreck.
My first instinct was that the sherd had to date to
the seventh century CE. It reminded me of the amphoras
from Yassiada I used to haul around the museum in Bo-
drum. The sherd was Mediterranean, at least in style if not
origin. It would have been easy to let my imagination run
wild, but after spending some time with the sherd, I was
confident of my initial analysis. I was holding a piece of a
Byzantine amphora found under water in the southern Red
Sea. As far as anyone knew, nothing of its like was known
to have been found previously in Eritrean waters. Indeed,
there were few other known ancient wrecks in the Red
Sea. The best known of these was the first-century CE
wreck at Zagrabad Island, Egypt. This wreck has been loot-
ed by sport divers, and the site was no longer archaeolog-
ically viable. Given that Eritrea had been at war-since the
early 1960s, sport diving had yet to affect the area. Thus, if
Malingri's sherd was indeed from a shipwreck, and not
merely ancient jettison, there was a good chance the site
could be in pristine condition.
The place where the sherd was discovered was the
Assarca Islands (var. sp. Assarka and Asarka). I was told
this name derived from an Arabic word meaning "Guard-
ian." The position of the Assarcas, in the middle of the
Massawa Channel, explained why the island was so
named. A careless captain could easily pile his ship onto
the island. Indeed, an old British pilot for the area warned
ships to give the Assarcas a wide berth.
Our survey team included Hillman, Yassin Aden of
the MMR, and myself. As none of the team had previous-
ly visited the site, we searched for it based on Malingri's
directions. Once at the islands, we began our search with
Yassin at our boat's helm, and Hillman and me in the wa-
ter equipped with snorkeling gear. We were towed behind
the boat scanning the seafloor with Hillman at the end of
one line, and myself at the end of a longer one. My first
thought was that we were the perfect shark bait: Two large
hunks of meat being trolled behind a boat. This, however,
came with the territory: the Red Sea has the highest con-
centration of sharks in the world. If we were going to wor-
ry about sharks, there was no point even getting into the
water. After about ten minutes of towing, Hillman spot-
ted something on the seafloor. He immediately dropped
off his line. A few seconds later, I saw something too: the
long shape of an amphora lying fully exposed on the seaf-
loor. Hillman and I gawked at it, thinking this had been
too easy. We grinned at each other before swimming down
to take a look Returning to our boat, we quickly donned
our scuba gear, and dived to examine the site.
Located at only twenty feet, the ceramics rested both
in the sandy areas between coral heads and atop the reef.
Some scattered sherds lay below the coral on sand that sloped
down to an undetermined depth. The artifacts were spread
over an estimated area of one hundred square meters. The
most noticeable aspect of the site was the pile of four or five
broken amphoras and assorted sherds lying in a group.
Examination of the site revealed four pottery types.
Three of these were closely related in decorative style and
fabric color. The most numerous type was a long, conical
amphora with a relatively wide mouth. The body was cov-
ered with horizontal ridges extending from the neck to the
vessel's toe, ending in a button. All examples were broken,
exposing a dark brown fabric. Two amphoras had intact
bodies, missing only handles and neck We noticed several
examples partially buried and others concreted into the reef.
We dubbed these long conical amphoras "Type I" (fig. 3).
The second type of vessel was similar to the sherd
raised by Malingri. Like his, none of these amphoras were
intact. Small sherds and handles were readily evident, but
no large pieces could be found. Malingri had reported that
the sherd he raised belonged to a type of amphora that
was lentoid in shape. Although we could find n6 conclu-
sive evidence of this, it was clear that this type was round
on at least one vertical axis. We therefore found no reason
to doubt his observation. The fabric color was the same
dark brown as the conical amphoras, indicating, possibly,
a similar origin for the two varieties. These "Type U" sherds
had ridges like the conical amphoras but they were verti-
'hoto: K. K. .redersen
Fig. 3. Amphora A3-010. This Type I vessel was the only onefound intact in the 1997 season.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
cal instead of horizontal. These vertical ridges aided in the
identification of sherds of this type.
The third amphora variety, "Type III," was also con-
ical, but it had a body noticeably wider than the "Type I"
amphoras. Found by Yassin, it was located at the eastern
end of the site. The neck, the handles, and the shoulder,
were missing. The amphora's toe was buried and thus not
examined. The body had horizontal ridges similar to the
other amphoras, and shared the same dark brown fabric.
Only one sherd of a possible fourth type, "Type IV,"
was found. This had no ridges like the others. Unlike the
dark-brown fabrics of the other types, this sherd had a light
brown fabric. There were no other discernable features.
We found no anchors, nor were any hull members
visible. Handfanning
around the site re-
vealed several ampho-
ras beneath the sand,
some of which were ly-
ing side by side. While
the exposed ceramics
were damaged and ap-
parently wave-tossed,
the more intact ampho-
ras under the sand indi-
cated that this was not
merely a cargo dump.
Although my
original opinion was
that the pottery dated
to the seventh century,
I believed a date a few
centuries earlier or lat-
er was also possible.
Upon my return to Fig. 4. Spartan and exposed, yet cor
New York, my further nearly two months. In the foregrou
research revealed this ground, our kitchen and dining ar
analysis was probably rounding the structures.
correct. Published ex-
amples of ceramics from sites in Africa and the Mediterra-
nean correlated to the ones at Assarca. The dates for all of
these ranged from the late fourth century through the sev-
enth. Most informative was a publication concerning an ex-
cavation on the Red Sea coast at Berenike, Egypt. Here,
amphoras of the narrow conical type, correlating to the As-
sarca Type I, were found in strata datable to 400 CE.
The importance of the shipwreck lies in its connec-
tion between the Mediterranean world and the first-cen-
tury Aksumite kingdom of Abyssinia, a kingdom noted
by both the Romans and the Byzantines as the "Third Pow-
er of the World" (see sidebar, page 14). Here at Assarca for
the first time, archaeologists had the opportunity to exam-
ine a ship within the realm of the Indian Ocean with links
to two of the major economic powers of the ancient world.
n
ul
The 1997 Field Season
Nearly two years of planning and preparation came
to a head in January of 1997. Unfortunately, it was not the
best time of year to work in the Red Sea, but circumstanc-
es had forced the project to be delayed from the previous
autumn. Thus it was that our nine-person team (compris-
ing Eritreans, Americans, a Briton, and an Ethiopian cook)
assembled in Massawa in mid-month. Using Dr. Hillman's
base at the Environmental Resources Division Headquar-
ters for our deployment, we gathered the supplies we need-
ed, including bedding and kitchen equipment, and materials
for a diving barge. For the platform, a dozen steel drums
were purchased from the Massawa power plant to serve as
a base. This required special permission, as the items were
in short supply. At four
by three meters, the
barge proved impossi-
ble to tow to Assarca.
We fastened it behind
the Norah, the ship that
took us to the islands,
but once underway the
bow wave in front of
the barge submerged
it. To continue would
have meant its destruc-
tion. We returned to
port, disassembled the
barge, and stowed the
timbers and drums on
the Norah. Ultimately,
we would build a
smaller platform, only
four square meters in
portable, our camp served us well for area, but large enough
d, the director's shelter. In the back- to support our surface
a. Note the tall euphorbia cacti sur- supply compressor, a
dive tender, and sup-
ply box. She was of
durable design, and she would serve us faithfully. The new
barge was dubbed Unsinkable II.
From our first day in the Assarcas at the beginning
of February, we were at the mercy of the elements. High
winds whipped our bleak little island. Clouds threatened
rain... and delivered it It was constantly chilly. This was
certainly not the weather I had been told to expect. As white
caps pounded the beach, I wondered how much excava-
tion we would get to do. Our spirits sank lower and lower
as the days of poor weather continued. We constructed a
bamboo and grass mat kitchen, and for other shelters we
used large blue tarpaulins (fig. 4). The first night brought
rain, as did most of the ensuing nights.
The cold windy days and rainy nights continued for
the first five days. People were itching to see the wreck.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
__
Then on the sixth day, Mother Nature rested.
Seeing our determination, perhaps she gave us
a break. Fine weather followed for three days,
during which we were able to locate the site and
anchor our newly constructed Unsinkable l over
it. Then, the storms returned. This weather pat-
tern repeated itself with uncanny predictabili-
ty. As we moved through February and March,
the weather changed to a pattern of five fair days
followed by three foul.
All materials, food, and water had to be
brought from Massawa on a weekly basis. The
thirty-mile journey took two to four hours, de-
pending on which supply boat was sent. Neither
the larger Norah or the smaller Abu Salema could
approach the island due to the surrounding reef.
In good sea conditions, we off-loaded the supplies
into our small inflatable boat from the anchored
vessel All, that is, but the twenty-five jerry cans Fig. 5. A.
of potable water. These were lashed together and world c
tossed overboard. Two people would then snor-
kel out to the cans and swim them ashore. In bad sea condi-
tions the supply boat anchored off the island's far side in the
lee of the wind, and everything had to be carried to our camp
one kilometer away. This was backbreaking work, but there
was no alternative. When it came time to leave Black Assar-
ca, the bad seas meant that we would be forced to carry all
our gear, including the excavated amphoras, across the is-
land. This took the better part of two days.
Our cook, an Ethiopian named Mulat (fig. 5), had
been a steward on various Ethiopian and Soviet naval
ships. Using two kerosene burners, Mulat fed us for near-
Fig. 6. A breakfast of adis. From left: Louise Fisher, Mulat (st
Tina Erwin, Yassin Aden, Ralph Pedersen, and Tesfay Tadessee
Photo. G. Nilsen
lulat, our cook. Veteran steward from Ethiopian and Soviet ships, Mulat
culinary wonders while battling goats for control of the kitchen.
ly two months. Without refrigeration or electricity, he pro-
vided filling and tasty meals, including fresh bread made
daily in nothing more than a frying pan. Fresh fish-in
abundance just meters away-was our sole source of pro-
tein. Mulat made the most of the pasta and lentils that were
the bulk of our menu. Good vegetables were hard to come
by in Massawa; fruit, however, was plentiful. Our favorite
meal was a dish Mulat called adis, a spicy stew of lentils
and tomato (fig. 6).
Water was always in short supply, so we husband-
ed it carefully. If we were to run out, we could take our
small boat over to the mainland, weather per-
mitting, and purchase water from the local chief-
tain at Inghel. Fortunately, this was never
necessary.
Black Assarca was inhabited by two hun-
dred goats. With no fresh water supply, these
caprids had adapted to drinking seawater. It was
amusing to see a herd of goats standing in the
surf drinking. Their food source was both the
scrub grasses and the euphorbia. They were cau-
tious about us at first, but as days progressed
they became curious and moved closer to our
camp. Soon, the goats were raiding our camp,
eating whatever they could. On several nights, I
was awakened by an eerie feeling I was being
watched. It was the goats. They would stand in
a semi-circle about ten feet away from my open
shelter watching me sleep. I guess I was the most
. Nilsen curious thing they had ever seen.
Four-inch spiders were the other notable
ending), inhabitants of our island. They were frighten-
ing, but we never learned whether the arachnids
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
were poisonous, as no one was bitten. Our first encounter
with one was when a spider came out of a roll of drafting
vellum. Faces paled at news of this discovery. From then
on, reports of the creatures came in regularly. Occasional-
ly, a shriek would ring out across the camp, and everyone
knew a spider had just surprised someone.
With Unsinkable II on the sea, we had to worry
whether her moorings, not to mention her structure, could
withstand the storms (fig. 7). The barge was anchored with
concrete blocks, which although barely movable on the
surface, tended to drag across the sea floor. Fortunately,
we had at our disposal the ruins of an old lighthouse and
its keeper's hut. A solar-powered lighthouse now stood
on the island, while the remains of a propane-powered
light-tower along with the ruins of the hut lay strewn about
the east side of the island. Concrete blocks, heavy angle
iron, corrugated roofing, and several empty propane cyl-
inders proved a bonanza for us. To the anchoring point
furthest out, we attached a large ship's anchor we had
brought in from Massawa. This anchoring point took the
brunt of the storms, as most came remorselessly from that
direction.
A second anchoring point was to the reef itself. As
this was on the lee of the storms, there was not much stress
here. The remaining two points, east and west, were the
ones giving us the most problems. Team member Charles
Pochin suggested using the propane cylinders as dead
weights attached to the barge's concrete block anchors.
Then, to keep the block and cylinder assembly from drag-
ging, pieces of angle iron arranged in an x-shape were to
be pounded into the seabed directly in front of the assem-
bly with the anchor line passing between the lower legs of
the "X."
The system worked. Pounding the pieces of six-inch
angle iron into the seabed, however, was no easy task. The
anchors lay at a depth of forty feet, the limit of our surface
supplied air. With the exertion of swinging a heavy ham-
mer, air was at a premium. Team member Tesfay Tades-
see and I went down to fix the angle irons in place. With
the air hoses pulled taut, there was little room to maneu-
ver. The noise of pounding the angle irons amplified to a
deafening roar underwater. After a few swings, I saw Tes-
fay's eyes bulge as he yelled something through his regu-
lator and pointed frantically over my shoulder. With the
thought of sharks in my mind, I spun around to see one of
the most mesmerizing sights I have ever seen. Swimming
broadside to us barely ten feet away was a huge fish. It
was larger than our nine-foot inflatable and taller than my
six-foot-plus frame. Its huge eye stared at us, while us hu-
mans, feeling puny indeed stared back in awe. Barnacles
covered parts of its body, indicating great age, while an
entourage of small colorful fishes escorted it. The fish ob-
viously had been disturbed in its lair somewhere in the
depths off Assarca by the noise we were making. Curiosi-
ty getting the better of him, it swam up to see what was
creating the disturbance.
As Tesfay and I watched the monster fish swim
slowly off, we stood on the seabed transfixed. Then Tesfay
tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to see him pointing
again, this time not into the sea but directly above us. I
looked up. There only a few feet away were two sharks
circling. These were the first sharks I had ever seen under-
water. We took a split second to admire them, and then
dropped to the seabed. We crawled on the sand until we
were under the barge. We surfaced and scrambled on
board. It was a dive never to be forgotten.
The sharks had come into the area three weeks after
we had landed on the island. This was no surprise, as I
had noticed two defined shark carcasses, one a hammer-
head, on the beach when I visited in 1995. For the first weeks
we had seen none. Suddenly they were everywhere. We
were a bit puzzled about the sharks' sudden appearance.
Fig. 7. The diving barge Unsinkable 1I in a storm (left), and in calm (right). The small platform, designed by Charles Pochin and
the director, survived many a storm and became a symbol of our perseverance. Photos: R. K. Pedersen
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
With the next supply delivery, we were in-
formed of the reason: Eritreans from poor vil-
lages occasionally cross the Red Sea to the
Arabian peninsula to find work as servants.
They do this in boats that are often unsafe and
overloaded, as this is all done unofficially. One
such boat, rated for forty-five people, was load-
ed with ninety. Once at sea, the overloaded boat
capsized. As only three people on board could
swim, the rest drowned. This attracted the
sharks into the area. Thus, along with foul
weather, we also had to deal with sharks that
had a taste for human flesh.
We had the good fortune to catch one
shark. Two team members were out in the in-
flatable boat fishing for our dinner when they
accidentally hooked the shark. We debated its
fate. In the end, it escaped being barbecued.
Team member Gary Nilsen removed the hook Fig. 8. 7
from its mouth with pliers, and the shark was sherds. I
pushed into the surf. This close encounter re- Type lar
moved the fear from most of us, but not the cau- side by s
tion. Then, several days into March, the sharks
vanished as suddenly as they came. We never saw them
again.
The ruins of the lighthouse were useful both for our
barge and our artifact storage tank. Using a concrete plat-
form found on the beach, we built a tank with concrete
blocks from the ruins of the keeper's hut. Realizing the
goats would jump into the tank to get water, we used the
remains of the corrugated roof of the keeper's house as a
cover. Still the goats came and we frequently had to chase
them off the cover. Although the seawater in the tank need-
ed daily replenishing due to leakage and evaporation, the
tank was an indispensable asset.
The Excavation
Over fifty-five days, we struggled to excavate the
site. With one of our two surface-supply compressors
mounted to the deck of Unsinkable II, two divers at a time
could work the site. A dive tender remained on the barge
monitoring the compressor, the divers, and the sea condi-
tions. Four small air bottles with regulators were positioned
on the site in case of emergency, although the shallowness
of the wreck allowed for an easy free ascent. Each dive
lasted forty-five minutes to an hour, depending on water
temperature.
Handfanning was our sole method of clearing off
overburden. Each diver was assigned a specific area to ex-
cavate. Artifact recording was by triangulation, the sys-
tem of measuring the position of an artifact using three
points, as the uneven bottom prevented the use of a grid.
Several datum points were set up around the site for this.
Meter tapes, each with a line level attached to aid in mea-
rnoro: i. r. reaersen
7ie deepest level of the excavation revealed yet more vessels and
n the foreground is a Type II amphora. Center left is the top of a
nphora, and center right are the toes of two Type I amphoras lying
ide. Whether any of these represent intact vessels is unknown.
surement, and plumb-bobs gave accurate measurements.
Coral pieces were removed from the site, and larger piec-
es were chiseled into more maneuverable sizes. Some arti-
facts were concreted into the coral. These were removed
with careful chiseling.
Each amphora was tagged and its position measured
before being removed from the site. Areas were designat-
ed "Al" through "AS." Thus, an artifact from area "Al"
would be given a number beginning with that designa-
tion, such as "Al-001." Once an artifact's position was re-
corded, it was placed in a storage area off the site until it
could be raised by underwater balloon. On the surface,
smaller artifacts were stored in seawater in buckets or
trashcans. Once ashore, amphoras were stored in trash-
cans and in the storage tank. Each team member was re-
quired to keep his own notes about his area and whatever
artifacts he raised. These notes included measurements and
drawings of the artifacts. Field drawings and conserva-
tion were by Tina Erwin. Artifact photography was by the
director.
Most artifacts were located in the field immediately
at the base of the reef. This area was excavated down to
approximately one meter below the original seabed (fig.
8). At this point, there were still ceramics to be excavated,
but time did not permit deeper excavation. Judging by one
amphora at this level, which was apparently standing
straight up, at least another sixty centimeters of wreck level
could be present. Indications from the area immediately
downslope of this amphora and under a large coral head
in the center of the site support this view. As the coral head
sat atop the amphoras, this area was excavated horizon-
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
tally. Thus, it was ascertained how one amphora lay piled
upon another to a depth of approximately a meter and a
half. As excavation undermined the base of the coral head,
threatening to cause it to tumble down, we suspended ef-
forts in this area.
Amphora sherds were ubiquitous. Even at the deep-
est levels of excavation, the sherds were found mixed in
among more intact vessels. The sheer number of the sherds
led us to dub the site 'The Place Amphoras Go to Die" (fig.
9). Perturbation, responsible for two well-encrusted spark
plugs found several centimeters
deep in the site, undoubtedly ac-
counts, in part, for the mix of
sherds. Wave action in storms may
account for our finding the ampho-
ras and sherds atop the reef.
As was noted on the 1995
survey, the most common ceramic
form in the site was the conical
amphora, Assarca Type-I. These
were found in all excavated sections
of the site. Although all but one was
broken, they formed a body of ma-
terial cohesive in both form and
style. Some amphoras were simply
missing handles. Others had necks
broken off as well, while many had
broken bodies. Several Type I am-
phoras were cleanly broken at the
joint where the upper body seg-
ment joined the bottom segment.
This was a weak spot in the vessels.
The juncture was obvious on all
Type 1 amphoras as the ridges, or
killing, at the joint was roughly
done. Unlike the evenly spaced rill-
ing applied to the body segments
while on the wheel, the killing add-
ed to the joint was irregular. Fig. 9. "The Place Am
The killing was a spiral, in- excavation revealed hu
terrupted at the joint, but other- with more intact ampho:
wise continuous from toe to neck. central area of the exca
On average, the skillfully placed Type I and globular TyA
spacing was approximately 1.2
cm. The team observed this decorative motif on all the am-
phora bodies they excavated or observed. This design was
peculiar to vessels of Syria, Palestine, and Egypt in the first
century, although later it could also be found distributed
throughout the Mediterranean.
The broken amphoras revealed that the Type I ves-
sels were covered in a brown wash or slip. The interior
fabric on most sherds of the type was red-brown when wet,
drying to dark brown. However, some sherds revealed a
light fabric, green-gray when wet, drying to gray. There
n
r
v
I
appeared to be no overt differences between the ampho-
ras or sherds with the brown or gray fabric. The colors
may be attributable to firing temperatures in the kiln, rather
than different clay sources, as a kiln that is too hot will
cause clays to turn white as they are fired.
Only one amphora was found completely intact. This
vessel, amphora A3-010 (fig. 3) was found toward the end
of the season near the western end of the excavation. Hav-
ing been overlaid with sherds of various sizes, as well as
coral and sand, the amphora was relatively free of encrusta-
tion- Its stopper was missing and the
vessel was filled with sand. The am-
phora's contents were sifted for ar-
chaeobotanical analysis but other
than the eggs of an unknown type
of sea animal, no botanical materials
were found. Small chips on the sur-
face of the amphora revealed it had
the gray fabric. Otherwise the form
and styling were the same as the
brown-fabric amphoras.
We also found a number of
sherds of Assarca Type II vessels.
None of these indicated a lentoid
shape, but rather a globular one.
More often than not, the necks of
these vessels still had their han-
dles attached. Not one of this
type, however, was found intact.
The largest piece had both neck
and handles and included a large
section of the body that extend-
ed down past the center of the
body's side. This enabled us to
see that the vertical killing cov-
ered the vessel, spiraling ulti-
mately to a small button in the
center of the side. Other Type II
phoras Go To Die." The sherds contained other areas of
dreds of sherds mixed in these bodies. At least one showed
-a bodies. Note here, in the a wide blank band separating the
nation, the mix of conical killing on either side of the body.
e II amvhoras. This band covered the area where
the two hemispheres of the ves-
sel were joined. According to The Handbook of Mediterra-
nean Pottery by John W. Hayes, this type of vessel is called
a costrel, common in Egyptian and Palestinian sites of the
first half of the first millennium.
The only example of Assarca Type m was that found
on the 1995 survey. Missing handles, shoulder, and neck,
the body of the amphora was similar in style to Type I (see
cover photo this issue, lower left). The shape, however,
was considerably wider than that variety. The pattern of
the rolling, the shape of the toe, and the brown fabric all
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
displayed an affinity to Type I. No traces of this vessel's
missing pieces were found. It is at present unknown
whether any of the numerous sherds found at Assarca
belong to this type of vessel. As such, the vessel is
unique to the site.
As noted during the survey, several thin, undec-
orated sherds were found. Some of these may have be-
longed to amphora stoppers, several of which were found
during the excavation. The stoppers were plain disks of
light brown color and fabric. One of these was found still
in place in an amphora
neck. The stopper rested on
a lip inside the neck and
was fixed in place with a
black/dark brown resinous
substance. Unfortunately,
this neck had long since
separated from the rest of
the vessel. Another type of
stopper was found in a
neck. Also, set in the resin-
ous substance, this stopper
differed from the others. On
the exposed face, the stop-
per had rilling similar to .
that of the amphoras. Obvi-
ously, a ceramic piece from
a broken vessel had been
knapped into a disk-shape
for this use. Such recycling .
of sherds for stoppers is not
unknown. The seventh-cen-
tury shipwreck at Yassiada,
Turkey, contained 165 of
these, of varying diameters
and thicknesses.
The insides of many 0
sherds and amphora bodies
contained the remains of a
coating. This was a black
resinous substance similar
to that used to fix the stop- Fig. 10. The neck of the gargol
pers in place. Mediterra- made by simply poking three h
nean wine amphoras were
sealed with a resin to prevent leaching through of the liq-
uids inside, and we find the same method in the Assarca
types. One sherd, which comprised only an amphora toe
split vertically, was filled with a solid mass of this resin.
This was the excess resin that collected in the bottom of
the amphora when the interior was being sealed. This piece
also revealed that the toe itself was not a solid piece but
was hollow,
None of the toes of the excavated Type I amphoras
showed much wear, indicating the vessels were relatively
e
o
new at the time of sinking. The toe was a simple knob 4.5
cm. in diameter and protruding 1.5 cm, with the rilling
started immediately above it.
Other Ceramics
Only one vessel was found that was not an ampho-
ra. This was the remains of a jug whose neck contained a
filter such as that found on a gargolette. The filter was
crudely done, made by simply poking three holes through
the clay (fig. 10). Little beyond the neck remained, but the
vessel was light in color
and thin walled.
Other artifacts
F ew artifacts were
'found that were not ceram-
: ics. One of these was apiece
of glass. Greenish-blue in
color, this piece appeared to
wineglass. A delicate hol-
e low rim was its most dis-
tinctive feature. Wine
.. :glasses found at other late
S:: Roman and Early Byzantine
Sites contain this feature.
Such glasses, often more
crude, were produced in
abundance in the fourth
and fifth centuries and lat-
er. Whether the presence of
this shard at Assarca indi-
cates a trade item or merely
scrap is unknown.
Found near the
glass shard was a weight in
2 cm. the shape of a lead ball (fig.
11). The weight had the re-
mains of a copper-based
Drawing: T. Erwin and S. Pulak hook on top. There was no
cladding over the lead, and
tte. The filter was crudely done, there were no distinguish-
les through the clay. ing features. It weighed ap-
proximately 520 gms. The
weight has parallels in Byzantine sites in the Mediterra-
nean dating to the mid-first millennium. The sixth and sev-
enth century levels at Sardis, Turkey, for example,
contained several such weights of various sizes. This type
of weight was a counterweight used on a steelyard, the
basic weighing instrument of the period. A number of steel-
yards have been found on other wrecks, including those
at Yassiada and Serge Limanl. The presence of this weight
on the wreck at Assarca may indicate that the steelyard
awaits future excavation.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Conclusions
At present, it is impossible to determine the nationality
of the ship. It is also not possible to determine whether the site
involves the remains of a ship headed to India, Arabia, or to
some point on Africa's Indian Ocean coast.
Possibly, the vessel was a local trader carry-
ing goods along the Eritrean coast or to as yet
undiscovered Aksumite settlements in the
Dahlak Archipelago. In any case, the site holds
great potential for our understanding of Red -
Sea commerce and seafaring in late antiquity,
of which we know little.
Our knowledge of ancient maritime
trade on the Red Sea relies in great part
on classical authors such as Pliny the
Younger and the anonymous author of the
Periplus of the Erythraean Sea. These writ-
ers recorded the kinds of cargoes carried
by Red Sea ships during the period of the
Roman/Byzantine Empire and the King-
dom of Aksum. However, the information Fig. 11. The I
they gave is far from complete, as the au- weight with th
thors mentioned only items they consid- its hook Drav
ered important. Ships' cargoes often win and S. Pu
included contraband, private cargoes car-
ried by individual crewmembers, personal belongings,
and other mundane items. These cargoes generally were
not recorded, and remain unknown. The first season's ex-
cavation of the shipwreck at Black Assarca gives us our
first glimpse at this little known trade.
C
e
!i
la
Epilogue
In the spring of 1998, war broke out between Eritrea
and Ethiopia. The war has been fought sporadically over the
past two years, mostly in the spring when the climate best
permits fielding large numbers of men. Approx-
imately one hundred thousand soldiers are re-
ported dead or missing on both sides. The
airport in Asmara has been bombed twice.
Large numbers of Eritreans have been deport-
ed from Ethiopia, and lately Eritrea has been
Sounding up the Ethiopians in their country.
S Refugees flooded dut of Eritrea into Sudan dur-
ing the most recent round of fighting, in which
Ethiopia struck deeply into Eritrea. The streets
of Asmara are deserted of young people, as they
S are all at the front. Outside the city, burgeon-
ing camps are harboring people fleeing the war
zone. Meanwhile, drought and famine are once
again wracking the region.
The Eritreans who worked with us on
d counter- Black Assarca and who became our friends
remains of were all veterans of the war of independence.
ng: T. Er- As such, they may have been required to fight
k. in the present war. Mulat, an Ethiopian, may
be one of those deported. I wonder if our friends
are safe and alive.
As of this writing the two warring countries have
agreed to a cease-fire and the installation of a United Na-
tions peacekeeping force along the Eritrean-Ethiopian bor-
der. Pray for a lasting peace. a
Acknowledgements: The 1997 excavation team consisted of Yassin Aden, dive master; Dania Avalone; Tina Erwin, field
illustrator and conservator; Inge Fischer; Louise Fisher; Meaze Naizghi; Gary Nilsen; Nesreddin Osman, dive master;
Charles Pochin; Tesfay Tadessee; and the director, Ralph K. Pedersen. The director thanks his team for their hard work
under mostly difficult circumstances.
We would like to thank the President of Eritrea, His Excellency Issaias Afewerki, for his permission to come to
Eritrea and conduct our research. We also thank the Minister of Marine Resources (1995-97) Saleh Meky; the Minister of
Marine Resources/Minister of Fisheries (1997) Petros Solomon; Kfle Woldeselassie, Head of Policy and Planning at
MMR, whose assistance and friendship is much appreciated; Zemede Tecle, Head of the Department of Culture (1995);
Dr. Woldeab Yisak, President of the University of Asmara; and Dr. Yoseph Libsekal, Director of the National Museum
and Head of the Archaeology Department at Asmara University. We also thank sincerely all those many others in
Eritrea who provided aid in uncountable ways, including Doi Malingri, without whose foresight this project would
never have happened.
Our sincere gratitude to Dr. John Sutton and Dr. David W. Phillipson of the British Institute in Eastern Africa;
Martha S. Pedersen, whose aid at our home base in New York juggling faxes, finances, and equipment was indispens-
able; Dr. Jerome Lynn Hall, Dr. Shelley Wachsmann, Dr. George F. Bass, Dr. Donny L. Hamilton, Dr. Henry Wright, Dr.
Lionel Casson, Dr. Faith Hentschel, Ficre Gebreyesus, Noreen Doyle, and Chris Monroe, all for providing support and
advice. Special thanks to Jeff Gers for providing invaluable editorial advice. We humbly thank Sema Pulak for turning
our field drawings into beautiful illustrations.
We especially thank the Hillman family, Chris, Sheila, Jessie and Jenny, who worked tirelessly hauling gear,
keeping us supplied, and doing countless chores as well as providing us with friendship. We salute them.
Funding for this project was supplied by the Haycock Memorial Fund of the British Institute in Eastern Africa, the
Institute of Nautical Archaeology, Harry C. Kahn II, Gary Nilsen, and Dr. George F. Bass. We are grateful to them all.
Lastly, and again, we especially thank Dr. George F. Bass for his friendship to the Pedersen family through difficult times.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
^
The Aksumite Kingdom and Eritrea:
The Historical Background
My interests in Eritrea, Ethiopia, and East Africa
extend back to boyhood. My interests were sparked not
only by articles in National Geographic Magazine, but also
by Moorehead's The Blue Nile. This tome related the au-
thor's journey up the Blue Nile to its source, as well as
the history of the area once known as Abyssinia. Later,
during the course of graduate studies, Ibecame intrigued
by the ancient civilization of the area known as the Ak-
sumite Kingdom.
The Aksumite Kingdom rose to prominence in
what are now Ethiopia and Eritrea in the first centuries
after Christ. Earlier, the area had frequent contact with
Ptolemaic Egypt, and Greek-inscribed stelae have been
found in the area. With increased sea-bone traffic and
trade from the Roman Empire, Aksum supplied luxury
goods gathered from the Ethiopian highlands. The Aksum-
ites fed the Roman hunger for ivory and hides in exchange
for wine, fine glass, oil, and metal objects. Aksum also served
as a waypoint in the trading network between the Red Sea
ports of Egypt and Arabia. This same network extended
beyond the Red Sea into the Indian Ocean. Roman, Arab,
and Aksumite ships sailed on the monsoon each year to In-
dia, a supplier of spices as well as an entrepot for goods from
the Far East. Taking advantage of the sea trade, as well as
having merchant colonies in Arabia, on Socotra, and in In-
dia, the Aksumites rose in wealth and power. They were
the only kingdom of ancient Africa to produce their own
coinage. These were at first in Greek, and then later in
Ge'ez, the ancient language of Abyssinia. The Aksum-
ites' importance was so great the Romans considered
Aksum one of the world's great powers.
It was only with the rise of Islam that Aksum be-
gan to wane. After the Islamic conquest of Egypt in the
early seventh century, contact between the southern Red
Sea and the Mediterranean was cut off. Without the im-
petus of Byzantium, the flow of goods up and down the
Red Sea stalled. With this, as well as other factors, Ak-
sum and the power it wielded began to wither. Over the
next century, Islam made inroads along the Abyssian
coast and finally, Islamic forces would conquer the area,
leaving the Christian Aksumite Kingdom to languish in
the highlands. Henceforth, Eritrea followed a separate
course from Ethiopia. Turning in on itself, Aksum would
soon be forgotten by the world at large, only to return to
consciousness with the Portuguese quest for the legend-
ary Prester John in the sixteenth century.
Archaeologically, Eritrea is little explored. There
was a German expedition to the ancient Aksumite port
of Adulis in 1906, and further explorations after World
War Two. A French expedition under Francis Anfray ex-
amined sites such as Matara in the 1970s. War, however,
kept much archaeological work in the realm of theory.
Eritrea, having once been part of the Ottoman Em-
pire, the Egyptian Caliphate, the Italian Empire, and then,
after 1945, a United Nations endorsed British Protector-
ate, had hoped for independence. The United Nations
placed the country, however, into a federation with Ethi-
opia. The federation was annulled with the forcible an-
nexation of Eritrea by Ethiopia in 1961. This sparked a
struggle for independence that was to last until 1993. With
the Marxist coup in Ethiopia in 1972, the Cold War heat-
ed up. Bitter fighting against the Soviet-backed power in
Addis Ababa, by not only the Eritreans but also the Ti-
greans, prevented archaeological research in the area for
nearly twenty years.
Famine was also endemic. Food supplies were
purposefully disrupted by the Marxist government in
an attempt to starve the freedom fighters. Many of the
photographs and reports of famine that sprinkled the
western press during the seventies and eighties were of
Eritrea and Tigre. These famines sparked the "Band-Aid"
concert of the mid-eighties. Money raised by the concert
and record sales was used to purchase food that was then
sent to Ethiopia. Once the food arrived in Massawa, how-
ever, the Marxist government used it as a bargaining chip
to undermine the cause of the freedom fighters. It was
not until the start of the end of the Cold War and the
collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 that the Eritrean and
Tigreans were able to prevail. With victory in 1993, the
Eritreans proclaimed their independence, r
Suggested readings
Anonymous
1989 The Periplus Maris Erythraei. Translation and commentary by Lionel Casson. Princeton, Princeton University Press.
Munro-Hay, S.
1991 Aksum: An African Civilisation of Lafr Antiquity. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press.
Pedersen, R.K.
1995 Survey Report: The Shipwreck at Assarca Island, Eritrea, http://homestead.juno.com/rkpedersen/assarca/htm
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
INA Responds to Turkish Earthquake Disaster
Dr. Gary Martin
Strong earthquakes devastated much of northwest-
ern Turkey on August 17, 1999, and again on November
12, killing more than eighteen thousand people and caus-
ing hundreds of millions of dollars in damage. Several
hundred thousand people were left homeless. None of us
will forget the horrifying images of the destruction and
human misery in the days that followed these unprece-
dented natural disasters.
Immediately after the August earthquake, friends
of the Institute began inquiring as to the well-being of INA
staff and students who were working in Turkey at the time.
They also wanted to know how they could help the peo-
ple of Turkey. In the weeks that followed, INA's members
and friends contributed more than $38,000 in assistance,
and many others wrote to say that they had already given
through other organizations.
Every penny of this money was used to directly aid
the people of Turkey. Dr. George Bass personally coordi-
nated distribution of the funds in-country. The Turkish
search and rescue team, AKUT, was in desperate need of a
specific type of electronic mini-camera and listening de-
vice. INA made arrangements with the California manu-
facturer for this apparatus to be built and shipped to Tur-
key. The device provided by INA was subsequently used
by the AKUT team in a successful rescue!
The bulk of the assistance went to the homeless of
Turkey most directly affected by this enormous tragedy.
The gifts you gave made a real difference in their lives.
George Bass personally delivered a check to a Turkish re-
lief organization which, under government approval and
supervision, built temporary housing for the homeless. The
buildings are designed so that when they are no longer
needed to house earthquake victims they will be convert-
ed to become neighborhood schools. INA and its friends
contributed more than $25,000 to this effort.
Neither INA's headquarters facility in Bodrum, Tur-
key nor the site of our current excavation of a fifth century
BCE shipwreck on Turkey's Aegean coast were directly
affected by the earthquake, but our hearts and our wallets
were opened to our Turkish friends. On behalf of the Board
of Directors of the Institute, thank you for reaching out
with us to assist the people of Turkey. o
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Call for Contributions
I would like to invite all members of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology and other interested
parties to consider submitting articles for publication in the Quarterly. I am looking for scholarly
writing pertaining to any aspect of nautical or maritime archaeology. The content need not be limited
to INA projects only.
An article may be of any reasonable length, and should preferably have illustrations (with
captions and acknowledgments). There should be a minimum of three references to appear under the
heading Suggested Readings. In addition to formal articles, the Quarterly also publishes News and Notes
that will be of special interest to the INA membership, and In the Field with reports of ongoing INA
activities. For submission guidelines see TNA Quarterly 27.1, 10.
I would also like to hear from all Nautical Archaeology students and alumni worldwide about
your thesis, dissertation, and research topics. I hope to use these in an article on what the people in
the field are doing. If you can send me a paragraph on your current status, I would be very grateful
I would enjoy talking about any ideas you may have for the Quarterly, so feel free to contact me
at any time. You can contact me at Editor, INA Quarterly, P.O. Drawer HG, College Station, TX 77841-
5137; tel (979) 845-6694, fax (979) 847-9260, e-mail powlrye@texas.net
Christine Powell, Editor
The INA Quarterly
'a d af
Kadirga: The Sultan's Galley
Erkut Arcak
INA archaeologists are currently studying Kadarga, a ship so well known to Ottoman history that its name means simply "Gal-
ley." Why is this vessel so important that it has become the galley in distinction to all others? Erkut Arcak offers some suggestions:
Kadirga, also known as the Sultan's galley, on display
in the Naval Museum in Istanbul, is the only original historic
galley still in existence (fig. 1). It was previously thought to date
to the mid-seventeenth century based on an inscription--
assumed to name Mehmed IV (1648-1687)--dorning the
galley's kiosk or canopied deck cabin at the stern (fig. 2).
However, additional research suggests an even earlier con-
struction date. Dr. Cemal Pulak and I initiated an investiga-
tion of the Sultan's galley in June of 1999, in order to study and
document the vessel in detail (fig. 3). We proposed to examine
the extant remains of the hull and details of construction, to
Photo: G. Tan
Fig. 1. The view from the stern towards the bow of Kadirga. Fig. 2. The kiosk of Kadirga.
Fig. 3. The author recording timbers on Kadirga.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
document the various renovations and restorations the vessel underwent during its long lifetime, and to place the ship
within a broader historical context.
Our investigations are far from complete, but they suggest that the keel, posts, and nearly all of the hull planking
has been replaced (fig. 4). Over the years of service, parts of the ship wore out and new parts were substituted, one at a
time. Despite the past renovations and restorations, Kadtrga still contains some original timbers. Although it has seen
significant modifications that have altered its original form, the ship is preserved in its entirety. Thus, it can expand our
knowledge of a type of ship for which we otherwise have only a few
poorly preserved archaeological examples.
We have no accounts of when Kadirga was built or to whom it
belonged. An inscription on the stern cabin names a certain Mehmed, so
there is a common belief that Kadrrga belonged to Sultan Mehmed IV,
nicknamed "The Hunter." However, the vessel may have belonged to
Sultan Mehrnmed II (1444-1446, 1451-1481), the conqueror of Constanti-
nople, who was the first Ottoman Sultan known to possess a private
galley decorated with precious stones on the kiosk. In a provocative ar-
ticle, Lucien Basch asserts that Kadirga might have belonged not only to
Mehmed U, but previously to the last Byzantine Emperor, Constantine
XI Palaeologos Dragazes (1449-1453). The venerable ship is decorated
with dragon-like figures; unlike a typical dragon with four legs, the beast
depicted on the galley has only two legs. These do not recall Ottoman
decorative style.
Still other scholars have speculated that Kadrrga was built in Ven-
ice and given to an Ottoman Sultan as a gift, with the kiosk added later
in Constantinople. If the cabin was not constructed at the same time as
the ship, the Sultan in the inscription-whether Mehmed II, Mehmed I
(1595-1603), or Mehmed IV-may not have been the first monarch to own
the vessel. An archival search at the Istanbul Naval Museum has revealed
several records that refer to the vessel as belonging to Sultan Mehmed II,
although others refer to Kadirga as first belonging to Mehmed IV. It is im-
possible to conclude that the authors of these documents knew any more
than we do.
Photo: E. Arcak
Fig. 4 (above). Cemal Pulak re-
cording the framing on Kadarga.
Fig. 5 (left). Osman II returning
from Hotin on a galley that may
have been Kadirga. Courtesy the
Topkapi Museum, Istanbul (Refer-
ence H1224 Folio 74a).
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Fig. 6. A galley (possibly Kadrga) carrying the Sultana Valide in 1671. Courtesy the Nederlandsch Scheepvaar Museum at Amsterdam.
Still, some evidence may illuminaterthe galley's sto-
ry. The first supporting evidence about the origin of Kadirga
is found on a seventeenth-century Ottoman miniature (ah-
Nami-Nadiri). This depicts Sultan Osman II (1618-1622) on
his galley as he returns from his expedition to the fortress of
Hotin in Hungary (fig. 5). The decorations, shape of the kiosk,
and the beasts on the galley shown in this miniature are suf-
ficiently clear to suggest that the galley is Kadirga. There are
aspects of the miniature that are different from the present
galley-26 oars on the miniature as opposed to 24, and the
beasts on the prow rather than at the stern. These may be the
result of artistic license, although Basch argues that the figures
were likely removed from the prow and placed at the after
end of each outrigger-box (apostis) at a later date. It is possi-
ble, then, that this may be the first known representation of
Kad4rga in Ottoman miniature art.
The second clue may be that of a galley carrying the
Sultana Valide (Sultan's mother), drawn by Nicolaes Wits-
en in 1671 (fig. 6). Distinctive features resembling Kadirga
include the presence of 24 oars, the kiosk, and a distinctive
silhouette with a very slight sheer, quite unlike the more
pronounced sheer of Ottoman galleys known to have been
built in the seventeenth century.
A Sultan's galley was represented again in the sev-
enteenth century by another miniature (Gazneli Mahmud
Albumu). Although this illustration of a galley under oar
on the Bosporus is not as detailed as the others, it is known
that the galley belonged to an Ottoman Sultan. The deco-
rations, beast figures, and kiosk again suggest Kadirga.
After its long life in the service of the Sultans, Kadtrga
was retired (we do not know when) and stored in the Impe-
rial Boathouse of the Topkapi Palace. Whether because of its
glamorous appearance or respect for earlier possessors,
Kadirga has never been a derelict. We must also ask whether
it was protected for its symbolic significance as a victory tro-
phy by the Ottoman Sultans throughout its active career.
On March 27, 1861, an article about Kad rga was pub-
lished in fehbal, an Istanbul newspaper. The article men-
tioned that a French naval architect came to Istanbul and
recorded Kadirga while it was stored in the Topkapi palace
boathouse. This was the first known documentation of the
ship, which was published in Admiral Paris's famous 1908
book Souvenirs de Marine Conserves.
The first known restoration of Kadirga was made in
1885 after an official request for repair and preservation
was signed, presumably by order of Abdi.lhamid 1 (1876-
1908). The decayed planks below the waterline were rez
placed, and the ship was renovated from spur to stem.
After the restoration, Kadirga was housed under an aw-
ning in the Yahkdokii shipshed of the Topkapi Palace until
it was transferred to Kasunpaya Imperial Shipyards in 1913.
During this period, the existence of the ship served
as a source of folklore and myth for the communities of
Istanbul and it was believed to possess sacred power. Af-
ter a visit to the Imperial Boathouse in Yahkoikii, Halil
Ethem Bey published an article about Kadirga that recount-
ed the myth surrounding the ship during those days:
I became extremely interested in the place
upon hearing stories that an ancient Venetian gal-
ley was stored there. One day I asked my friend
Osman Aga about the place. Osman Aga was one of
the Chief Oarsmen at the Palace. He told me that
the galley was the most extraordinary relict from
the days of Sultan Mehmed "the Hunter." It pos-
sessed spiritual powers and every night an oil lamp
was lighted on top of it. He told me several other
strange and frightening tales concerning the galley,
so that I simply had to see it The next day 1 obtained
permission to do so.
The guildsmen took me inside the boathouse.
Fascinated, and with deep respect, we walked
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
around the great hull. As a special favor for
me they lifted back the tarp covering the stem
cabin.
The kiosk was worked in ivory and
mother of pearl, and decorated with rock
crystal and turquoise (stones). I was tremen- .
dously moved standing next to this most ven-
erable object. The guildsmen gave me a
handful of dust from some of the decaying
wood. I left the boathouse filled with awe.
By the end of the century, after the guilds-
men who took care of imperial caiques (ceremo-
nial barges), and especially Kadirga, were
abolished, the legend slowly waned and the ship
was nearly forgotten. Dismissed from memory,
the ship began to deteriorate: the paint began to
spall, the mother-of-pearl and tortoise-shell or- Fig. 7. K
namentation fell off, and the engraved silver barge--
plaques adorning the kiosk were stolen.
When the Ottoman government decided to demol-
ish the Imperial Boathouse, Kadirga and all the Sultan's
caiques were transferred on March 27, 1913 to the Imperi-
al Shipyards across the Golden Horn in Kasmupa.a. The
total expense of this trip was 22,810 kuru which was pro-
vided by the Seraglio's budget during the reign of Sultan
Mehmed V (1908-1915). Kadirga was afloat on the Bosporus
for the last time during this transfer to the shipyard. Dete-
rioration had taken its toll, but according to some not a
drop of water was taken on.
Despite the weakened state of the Ottoman Empire
during World War I, Kadirga was not completely forgot-
ten. In a 1917 museum catalog, Ali Sami Bey, director of
Fig. 8. Kadlrga on display at the Istanbul Naval Museum.
adirga crossed the Bosporus for the last time--unfortunately, by
n 1953. Courtesy of the Istanbul Naval Museum.
the Naval Museum, gave a brief description of the ship.
This focused on original decorative painted carvings of
Kadirga, still preserved despite a long period of deteriora-
tion. Due to the collapsing economy, there was no funding
for the preservation of the vessel.
When it survived the demise of the Ottoman Em-
pire in 1923, Kadirga was in a "somewhat dilapidated con-
dition" as described by Commander F. G. Schurr.
According to the pair of photographs taken at Kasrnpa-a
shipyards, and published in Mariner's Mirror in 1923, the
lower strakes were decayed and parted from each other.
However, with the new republic in Turkey, Kadirga was
restored and renovated by order of the new government.
The condition of Kadirga seems to have been very
good by 1939, to judge by a photograph then
published in a National Geographic Magazine ar-
ticle about the new face of Turkey. By compar-
ing the stem strakes on these photographs, it is
clear that another major restoration, for which
no documents exist in the state archives, must
have taken place between 1923 and 1939.
Despite the constant overhaul processes,
the storage facilities for Kadirga did not protect
it from the ravages of time, and the ship contin-
ued to deteriorate further. Consequently, in 1944
restoration of the kiosk section was initiated by
the Topkapi Palace Museum staff, and in 1950
most of the hull was repainted and the decora-
tions on the heavy outrigger stringer were re-
drawn and painted in by the members of the
Art Faculty of Istanbul University.
SG T When the new Naval Museum was opened
3to: G. Tan
at BeSikta$ in 1953, the Turkish government de-
cided to transfer Kadirga and the imperial
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
caiques from Kasimpaga to BeSikta$. This was to be
Kadirga's last trip on the Bosporus. However, this time it
was necessary to transport the aged vessel by barge (fig.
7). From 1953 to 1970, the kiosk was removed from the
ship and displayed in a separate room. Before the ship was
placed on exhibit, one final major restoration was under-
taken.
In 1957, the lines of the galley were recorded by Ata
Nutku, the director of the Shipbuilding Institute of Istan-
bul Technical University. Despite the lack of detail in his
constructional drawings, this study included the first com-
prehensive representations of the decorations on the ves-
sel and a short description of the ship. In 1970, Kadirga was
placed on public display in the gallery of historical caiques
in the Naval Museum in Istanbul, where it may be seen
today (fig. 8). In 1982 and 1983, some of the tortoise-shell,
ivory, ebony, and mother-of-pearl ornamentation was re-
placed and the entire ship repainted (fig. 9). Another res-
toration of the kiosk is presently underway.
This is the tantalizing story of the last surviving his-
toric galley in the world. We have yet to determine the
origin of Kadirga. Although far from completed, our pre-
liminary research of the hull suggests that a date before
the middle of the seventeenth century cannot be ruled out,
and that an earlier construction date is certainly possible.
While asking the question "when", it is also impor-
tant to answer the question "why" this ship was preserved
alongside the other Imperial boats. If Kadirga was indeed
constructed before the seventeenth century, and belonged
to one of the Mehmeds of the Ottoman Dynasty, Mehmed
11 seems likely. In Ottoman history, Mehmed II has always
been legendary as the conqueror of Constantinople. It
seems more likely that Mehmed U's vessel would be pre-
served as a tribute to its owner (and, possibly, captor), rath-
er than one belonging to a Sultan who had less of an impact
on Ottoman history. Clearly, extensive additional research
is necessary to completely understand the fascinating sto-
ry of the unique galley Kadirga. a,
Acknowledgments: I would like to take this opportunity to thank the staff of the Istanbul Naval Museum whose
help and assistance has been invaluable throughout this project. My thanks also go to INA and-in particular-Cemal
Pulak, whose encouragement and support has been inestimable.
thoto: G. lan
Fig. 9. The stern kiosk of Kadirga after its restoration in the early 1980s.
Suggested Readings
Basch. L Brookes. D. S.
1974 "A Galley in Istanbul Kadirga." Mariner's Mirror 1990 "The Turkish Imperial State Barges." Mariner's
60: 133-134. Mirror 76: 41-49.
Basch. L,
1979 "Kadirga revisited." Mariner's Mirror 65: 39-50.
Tezel, H. and M. E. Cahkoglu.
1983 Bogazii ve Saltanat Kayiklan. Istanbul.
[NA Quarterly 27.2/3
His Majesty's Hired Transport Schooner Nancy
Christopher R. Sabick
Archaeologists from the Nautical Archaeology Pro-
gram at Texas A&M University have spent three years
uncovering the secrets of a vessel that played an impor-
tant part in the War of 1812. Before the outbreak of the
American Revolution, English furtraders had several op-
tions for shipping their goods into the interior of the conti-
nent. Although the majority of their wares were sent down
the Ottawa River with voyageurs in large canoes, they also
had the option of sending goods as far as Grand Portage
(near the tip of the "arrowhead" of present-day Minneso-
ta on the north shore of Lake Superior) in the hulls of pri-
vate sailing vessels that operated on the Great Lakes. This
route was particularly useful for items that were difficult
to carry in canoes, including kegs, stoves, and sheets of
iron.
With the outbreak of the American War of Indepen-
dence, the government of Upper Canada placed severe re-
strictions on the lake trade by demanding that all goods be
carried in the Crown's vessels. This was a major blow to
the growing fur trade in Montreal. With the King's vessels
busy transporting troops and goods around the Lakes re-
gion, they had little time or space to carry commercial
goods. Items that were sent in Royal vessels were often
delayed by months-in some cases, a year or more. The
fur companies were willing to put up with these restric-
tions while the war was in progress. They were, of course,
transporting exactly the types of items that would be use-
ful to the rebel colonies: muskets, powder, shot, blankets,
and foodstuffs. What outraged the traders in Montreal was
that these restrictions remained in place after the war end-
ed in 1783.
With their trading areas now extending as far west
as the Canadian Rockies, these merchants were desperate
to reduce their shipping costs in any way possible. To this
end, the traders began petitioning the government for re-
moval of the restrictions. With their business bringing more
than twenty thousand pounds a year in taxes, the mer-
chants carried some political weight. In 1788, the govern-
ment opened Lake Ontario to private navigation, and
extended it to all the Great Lakes in 1789.
The first company to take advantage of the lifting of
these restrictions was Forsyth Richardson and Co. This
small firm was formed in 1787 to compete directly with
the much larger and wealthier North West Co. In hopes of
reducing their shipping costs, the company sent one of its
partners, John Richardson, to oversee the construction of a
sailing vessel at Detroit. Richardson, who had served as
supercargo on the British privateer Vengeance during the
American Revolution, traveled to Detroit with a shipwright
and party of shipbuilders, arriving on June 20. The crew
set up camp on the banks of the River Rouge south of De-
Fig. 1. The area of the Great Lakes where Nancy spent her ca-
reer as a civilian merchantship.
troit and launched their vessel by November. Richardson
described the new schooner "...as a perfect masterpiece of
workmanship and beauty." He goes on to mention that "...the
cost to us will be great but there will be the satisfaction of her
being strong and very durable."
The vessel, constructed of white oak and red cedar,
was adorned with a figurehead that Richardson describes
"...as a lady dressed in the present fashion, and with a hat and
feather." It is from this figurehead that the schooner became
known as Nancy, named after either Richardson's wife or
daughter who shared the name.
The vessel sailed on its maiden voyage on June 19,
1790, heading for Fort Erie. This was to be the first of doz-
ens of journeys across the Great Lakes that the schooner
would make during her long career (fig. 1). Though his-
torical documentation of Nancy's merchant career is some-
what limited, it is clear that she spent most of her time
traveling between Fort Erie at the western end of Lake Erie,
Detroit, and Michilimackinac on Mackinac Island at the
juncture of Lakes Huron and Michigan.
The payment schedule in figure 2 shows the types
of goods typically carried in lake vessels and the cost of
shipping them. However, historical documentation shows
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
that Nancy was not used exclusively for commercial trade.
On at least two occasions, in 1794 and again in 1801, she
was hired to carry government dispatches to outposts .tiB
around the Lakes. In two other instances, she was em- t -ih4 I
played by the military as a troop transport. The journal of lpi
a trader at Michilimackinac even reports that Nancy ar-
rived from Lake St. Clair carrying a Native American chief R0'I
and his family who were to receive presents. i1 'it co or
Nancy continued to operate in this capacity for For- byp^^rc14
syth Richardson and Co. until that concern joined with oth- W9n il
er small competitors of the North West Co. to form the XY ,
Co. This new firm took the larger business head on, caus-
ing the price of furs to increase dramatically. As this was J.41il'
harmful to all concerned, members of the North West Co.
advocated a union with the competition. In July of 1804,
the XY Co.-and Nancy-were absorbed into the larger
firm.
Nancy continued in her role as a merchant ship up to
the outbreak of hostilities between the United States and
United Kingdom in 1812. When word of the Declaration of
War by the U.S. reached British commanders on the Lakes,
they immediately took control of Nancy, which was docked
at Moy, opposite Detroit From this location she sailed on
July 30 in convoy with other vessels carrying troops to re-
inforce the faltering militia force at Fort Erie (fig. 3).
Nancy spent the remainder of the summer of 1812
carrying troops and supplies throughout Lakes Erie and
Fig. 2. Payment schedule for shippers sending their goods in
Nancy. Courtesy the Detroit Public Library.
Huron, then wintered in Detroit. During the summer of
1813, the schooner participated in the unsuccessful British
sieges of Fort Meigs and Stephenson in northern Ohio.
After this stint as a troop transport, Nancy was used
to carry supplies and troops to the isolated fort at Michili-
mackinac. Nancy departed Detroit on August 31, 1813 and
arrived at the northern fort ten days later. After unloading,
the schooner was employed transporting supplies from the
other British posts on Lake Huron to the fort at Mackinac for
the remainder of September. During the first week of Octo-
ber, Nancy was ordered to return to Amherstburg with a
load of sugar, gunpowder, and cannon for the fort there.
The captain and crew of Nancy were unaware that
the entire nature of the war on the Great Lakes had changed
while they were away on their errand to the north. On Sep-
tember 10,; the American and British fleets on Lake Erie
had met in combat at Put-in Bay. After a hard fought three-
hour battle, the American fleet under Commander Oliv-
Fig. 3. The scenes of Nancy's military career. er Hazard Perry defeated and captured the entire British
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
fleet of Commander Richard Barclay. This left Nancy as
the only remaining British Naval vessel on the upper Lakes.
In addition to this major naval setback, the American forc-
es had followed up on this victory by recapturing Detroit
and taking Amherstburg, effectively gaining control of the
passage between Lakes Erie and Huron.
Nancy's crew were made aware of this situation as
they were preparing to enter the St. Clair River. They
quickly returned to the open waters of Lake Huron and
attempted to reach Michilimackinac in order to inform the
garrison there of the debacle on Lake Erie. After traveling
the majority of Lake Huron, the schooner encountered a
violent storm and was forced to run before the strong gale
for three days. Nancy was carried back to within eighty
miles of the St. Clair River before the storm broke. With
sails tattered and hull leaking badly, Nancy limped into
Michilimackinac. After this, it was sent to the Falls at St.
Mary's for the winter.
In the spring of 1814, British Naval authorities de-
cided that Nancy should come under the command of a
Royal Navy officer. Up to this time, the vessel had been
captained by Alexander Mackintosh, who had been her
peacetime captain. In February of 1814, Lt. Newdgate
Poyntz was assigned to command the vessel. He traveled
a newly established supply route to the northern lake. With
the St. Clair River closed to them, the British were forced
to ship supplies north from York (modem day Toronto)
overland to Lake Simcoe, upon which they were floated
to the western shore and portaged to the headwaters of
the Nottawasaga River. From here they could be floated
down to Georgian Bay for delivery in Nancy to Michili-
mackinac.
Upon taking command of Nancy in early May,
Poyntz was employed in transporting supplies to Michili-
mackinac. There appears to have been a dispute between
Poyntz and Lt. Col. McDouall, the military commander at
Fig. 4. The battle at the mouth of the Nottawasaga River.
Michilimackinac, that escalated to the point of Poyntz be-
ing removed from his command.
He was replaced by Lt. Millar Worsley, who served
with the large British fleet on Lake Ontario. Worsley also
reached Lake Huron by the new overland supply route,
arriving at the mouth of the Nottawasaga River in mid-
July. When Nancy arrived at the end of the month, he and
his crew set about loading the schooner with supplies from
the storehouse a couple of miles upstream.
At this same time, a powerful American force un-
der the command of General George Croghan entered Lake
Huron intent upon capturing Fort Michilimackinac. This
flotilla comprised the twenty-gun brigs Niagara and
Lawrence, the schooners Tigress and Scorpion, and some sev-
en hundred troops. When the fleet arrived off Mackinac
Island on July 26, McDouall sent word to Worsley that the
expected American attack had arrived. After thoroughly
planning their attack, the American troops stormed ashore
on August 4. They were beaten back by strong British op-
position and fierce attacks by the Crown's Native allies.
Seeing that the fort would not be captured without a pro-
tracted siege, Crogan and the American fleet went in search
of easier prey, namely Nancy. The American commander
reasoned that, if he destroyed the supply base on the Not-
tawasaga and Nancy, Michilimackinac would fall quickly.
Upon receiving McDouall's warning, Worsley de-
cided defend his vessel from land. As Nancy was armed
with only four guns, two six-pound long guns and two
twenty-four-pound carronades, he had no hope of stand-
ing up to the American vessels in the open water. He and
his crew warped their schooner about a mile upstream from
the river mouth and anchored her there. This left the Nan-
cy separated from the open waters of Georgian Bay by a
narrow strip of land. The crew members hastily built a log
blockhouse on a hill overlooking the ship and armed it with
the vessel's guns (fig. 4).
The American fleet appeared off the mouth of the
river on August 13. Although the brig Lawrence had re-
turned to Detroit carrying American wounded from the
attack on Michilimackinac, Worsley and his crew were
hopelessly outnumbered. The British could field only twen-
ty-one seamen and ten Native American allies. Against this
force, the Americans had the guns of the Niagara and four
hundred soldiers.
These troops began landing the following morning.
Amazingly, Worsley and his men were able to hold off the
attackers until mid-afternoon. At that point, the Americans
landed two howitzers that began dropping explosive shells
on and around the blockhouse. One of these shells detonat-
ed the powder supply in the blockhouse, destroying it See-
ing that the situation was hopeless, Worsley was forced to
order the destruction of Nancy. She was quickly set afire as
the British defenders melted away into the surrounding for-
est. Worsley's force had escaped with only one man killed
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
and four wounded. Nancy was not so lucky. Being fully lad-
en with cargo, she burned furiously before sinking into the
waters of the Nottawasaga River. The twenty-five-year-long
career of Nancy had finally come to an end.
The hull of the schooner formed an obstruction in
the river and over the following years silt began to deposit
around it, eventually forming a small island. The vessel
was never really forgotten. Indeed, it remained clearly vis-
ible into the late nineteenth century, before mud and silt
swallowed it. In the following years, the area around the
mouth of the Nottawasaga River became a popular vaca-
tion destination. The beautiful sand beaches of Georgian
Bay attracted tourists from across Canada. Along with the
increased tourism came an increased interest in local his-
tory. This brought Nancy's story to the attention of a num-
ber of interested locals who began to search for the vessel's
remains.
On a visit to the area, noted Canadian historian C.
H. J. Snider located the remains of the schooner, half sub-
merged in the side of the small island. Word of this dis-
covery spread and by the 1920s there was interest in
recovering the hull. During the summer of 1925, a group
of interested locals took this task to heart and began to ex-
cavate the remains from the mud (fig. 5}. They recovered
numerous artifacts, including pieces of the ship's equip-
ment, plates, cups, rigging, weapon fragments, and hun-
dreds of pig bones from the provisions that had been on
board. They even located clumps of flour from the casks
that were to be shipped to Michilimackinac. Unfortunate-
ly, as was common at this time, most of these artifacts found
their way into private collections and very few of them
can be located today,
However, the largest artifact of all, Nancy's hull, is
still present for all to see. After its excavation, it was de-
cided that the schooner would be kept in a museum built
on the island it helped to create. This museum is known as
the Nancy Island Historic Site. The remains were immedi-
ately placed in an enclosure and have stayed in one for
most of the following years. This has led to a very well
Fig. 5. In 1925, a group of interested locals began to excavate
Nancy's remains. Courtesy the Detroit Public Library.
preserved hull, but one that had never been thoroughly
studied.
During the summer of 1997, a team of five archaeol-
ogists from Texas A&M University's Nautical Archaeolo-
gy Program traveled to Ontario to record the hull remains.
They followed a thorough documentation of the hull by
historical research into the history of the vesseL This was
carried out in the National Archives of Canada, the Public
Records Office in London, and numerous small collections
throughout the Great Lakes region. A description of the
hull remains and its construction style will be covered in a
future article. a,
Acknowledgments: My study of the construction and history of Nancy could not have been completed without the sup-
port of numerous people. I would like to thank my recording team which consisted of Erich Heinold, Brian Atchison,
Chris Patlevony, and Eric Emery. Thanks also go to the staffs of the Canadian National Archives, Public Records Office,
and Detroit Public Library for their assistance in my historical research. Last but not least, this project could not have
gotten off the ground without the continued support, encouragement, and friendship of Dr. Kevin Crisman.
Bass, George F
1988 Ships and Shipwrecks of the Americas. New York:
Thomas and Hudson Ltd.
Gilpin, Alec.
1958 The War of1812 in the Old Northwest. East Lansing:
The Michigan State University Press.
I Readings
Innis, Harold A.
1930 The Fur Trade in Canada. New Haven: Yale Univer-
sity Press.
Snider, C. H. J.
1936 Leaves From the War Log of the Nancy. Huronia
Historical Devlopment Council.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
The Trade Axes of La Salle's Ship La Belle
Mark A. Feulner
Among the many finds recovered from La Belle dur-
ing the 1996 and 1997 excavations were the goods La Salle
brought for trade with the native population. Scattered
throughout the wreck were numerous glass beads, brass
pins, and pewter hawk bells that were used by Native
Americans for personal adornment. In addition, there were
various metal goods. These were popular trade items due
to their superiority to native tools. The most conspicuous
goods were three large casks filled with iron axes (fig. 1).
The first cask we disassembled was the smallest of
the three, cask feature #72. The removal of the staves and
ends of this barrel exposed a set of lightly concreted axe
heads, with over half of them still in their original positions.
The axes had been arranged with their eyes to the outside
and the blades oriented toward the center, the overlapping
blades forming a helical pattern. About a third of the axes
had been shifted out of this pattern, either due to the wreck-
ing process or to the container being partially unpacked
by the settlers. We recovered eighty-seven complete axe
heads from the cask, along with fragments suggesting an-
other seventeen axes, for a total of 104 specimens.
The two larger barrels, cask features #29 and #63,
did not appear to have been as neatly packed as the small-
er one. There was no discernible pattern to their arrange-
ments, and the random positioning of the axe heads
allowed the formation of heavily concreted masses inside
the two casks. Although the axes may have shifted when
La Belle wrecked, there was evidence of packing material
in the form of straw or pine needles found in both barrels.
This was not found in cask feature #72. The use of pack-
ing material and the heavy amount of concretion found in
these two barrels suggest that they were loosely packed,
perhaps because their larger diameters did not lend them-
selves to helical packing patterns.
There were 119 complete axe heads recovered from
cask feature #29. An additional 157 fragments were recov-
ered, indicating an estimated total of 276 axes. Cask feature
#63 contained 101 whole axes. Also, 154 fragments were re-
covered, 108 of them blades, for an estimated total of 255
specimens.
There are several distinctive features of these early
trade axes that set them apart from other styles of axes.
They have long, flat-topped blades that flare downward
from the eyes along their lower margin. The eyes are circu-
lar or ovoid, and lack a lip. And, most noticeably, these axes
have no poll, meaning that the iron that encircles the eye is
not thickened on the face opposite the blade. This simple de-
sign made trade axes like those on La Belle easy to manufacture
quickly. A wrought iron bar was heated and bent into an U-
shape. The two ends of the bar were then brought together
around a drift, the shape of which determined the final shape of
the eye. The two ends were welded together, and the final shape
of the axe was hammered out Once given its shape, an edge
could then be ground out of the iron, or a steel bit could be
inserted. This method of manufacture yielded blades that
varied greatly in size, ranging from 85 centimeters to 13 cen-
timeters in length. We measured the length along the bot-
tom of each axe blade, from its edge to where the eye began.
This measurement was selected in order to record axes with
broken eyes, and it permitted the measurement of some
blade fragments as well.
Another feature that was apparent on a number of
the axes was the presence of trademarks stamped onto the
blades. These marks were one to two square centimeters
in size, and were usually stamped into one face of each
blade. The most common was an asterisk consistirig of four
intersecting raised bars in a round cartouche (fig. 2). There
was also a handful of axes stamped with the initials "DG"
Fig. 1. Profile of five axes, showing their range in
size. The Venus symbol ( can be seen on the second
axe from the right.
Photos: Stephanie Judjahn, courtesy of Texas Historical
Commission and Conservation Research Laboratory.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Fig. 2. Detail of the asterisk cartouche. Fig. 3. Detail of the Venus symbol.
or "DC" in raised letters. An interesting cartouche con-
tained the Venus symbol (9) commonly known as the sym-
bol for women (fig. 3). There were several marks consisting
of a raised crescent surrounded by three raised dots and a
few of the letter "M" found on axes from cask feature #63.
Cask feature #29 yielded some axes with a fleur de lis car-
touche and others with a pattern of two or three punch
marks.
The axes recovered from La Belle are a good exam-
ple of the iron axes brought to North America by Europe-
an traders in the seventeenth century. Similar examples of
trade axes have been excavated from Pemaquid and Pen-
tagoet, Maine. This style of trade axe has also been discov-
ered in Florida. Underwater investigations of river systems
emptying into the Great Lakes have recovered a large num-
ber of specimens that also resemble the La Belle axes.
The iron trade axes recovered from the wreck of La
Belle present a collection of artifacts representative of a sig-
nificant component of early colonial trade in North Amer-
ica. In the seventeenth century, the value of an iron axe to
white settlers as a tool was only surpassed by its worth in
barter with natives. The importance of axes and other metal
goods in colonial bartering makes the collection from La
Salle's La Belle an important find. Comparative analysis of
these trade axes and other collections will enhance our un-
derstanding of early New World trade. a
Suggested Readings
Camp, Helen B.
1975 Archaeological Excavations at Pemaquid, Maine 1965-1974. Augusta, ME: The Maine State Museum.
Faulkner, Alaric and Gretchen Faulkner
1987 The French at Pentagoet 1635-1674: An Archaeological Portrait of the Acadian Frontier. Augusta, ME: The Maine
Historic Preservation Commission.
Mercer, Henry C.
1975 Ancient Carpenters' Tools. Bucks County, PA: Horizon Press.
Woodward, Arthur
1970 The Denominators of the Fur Trade: An Anthology of Writings on the Material of the Fur Trade. Pasadena, CA: Westerlore
Press.
Woolworth, Alan R.
1975 "Description of the Artifacts Recovered from the Quetico-Superior Underwater Research Project." In Voices
from the Rapids: An Underwater Searchfor Fur Trade Artifacts 1960-73. Ed. RC. Wheeler, pp. 55-84. St. Paul, MN:
Minnesota Historical Society.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
In the Field
Tektaf Burnu
George Bass and his archaeo-
logical team are preparing for a sec-
ond summer excavating the
fifth-century BCE shipwreck at Tekta
Bumu, Turkey (see INA Quarterly
26.4). This project has the potential for
illuminating a period that was not only
the Golden Age of ancient Greece, but
also one of the high spots of all human
history. The INA team is conducting
the first archaeological investigation of
a shipwreck from the era of the Athe-
nian Empire, which was dependent on
seafaring. Grants from the National
Endowment for the Humanities and
National Geographic Society, the
backing of both INA and Texas A&M
University, and the continued help of
Turkish Airlines will make this possi-
ble. Dr. Bass also plans to conduct a
fall survey with a two-person sub-
mersible just built by Seamagine of
California for INA with support from
the Institute for Aegean Prehistory.
Azores
The millennium season in the
Azores will continue work that has
been progressing in the islands since
1996. The project is sponsored by INA,
Texas A&M University (TAMU), and
the Centro Nacional de Arqueologia
Nautica e Subaquatica (CNANS) of the
Portuguese Ministry of Culture, in col-
laboration with the Lake Champlain
Maritime Museum. Dr. Kevin Crisman
of TAMU will continue to lead the
project. This season's work, from the
beginning of July through mid-Au-
gust, will be a two-fold undertaking
including both a survey and timber re-
cording. The survey, with participa-
tion from Lee Cox of Dolan Research,
will start at the bay at Angra do
Heroismo and expand to include ar-
eas outside the harbor on the south
coast of Terceira. Since local records
show that many ships have wrecked
near Angra, a survey may yield future
excavation targets.
An emergency excavation held in
1997 to excavate and move two sixteenth-
or seventeenth-century shipwrecks, An-
gra C and Angra D, successfully saved the
ships from destruction by a marina con-
struction project in Angra Bay (see TNA
Quarterly 25.2, and 26.1). This season's
work will focus on completing the tim-
ber recording for both wrecks. Dr.
Crisman's archaeological team will in-
clude TAMU Nautical Archaeology
Program graduate students Sara Brig-
adier, Erika Laanela, Mason Miller,
and Anthony Randolph, with former
TAMU students Brian Jordan and Julie
Polzer. Archaeologists from the CNANS
Department of the Azores-Catarina Gar-
cia, Paulo Monteiro, and Erik Phaneuf-
have been working on the site analysis,
and will continue with the additional
information uncovered this year. A pro-
ductive season will pave the way for fu-
ture INA projects in the Azores.
Black Sea
In September, INA archaeolo-
gist Cheryl Ward will be back in the
Black Sea on a deep sea research ves-
sel with Kathryn Willis of the Nauti-
cal Archaeology Program at Texas
A&M University. The Institute for Ex-
ploration expedition, led by Robert
Ballard, will be using remote survey
and imaging technology. In addition
to seeking ancient ships to better un-
derstand seafaring in the Black Sea re-
gion, the team will continue its efforts
to define the ancient coastline of ca.
5400 BCE (see INA Quarterly 26.3).
Malta
In April of 2000, Brett Phaneuf
(INA) and Matt Meyer (Department of
Oceanography, TAMU) conducted an ar-
chaeologicalhazard survey in cornunction
with the Malta Maritime Authority, the
Malta Museums Department, and a Mal-
tese architectural firm, TBA Periti. To
ensure that no archaeological resourc-
es possibly present in the sub-bottom
were damaged, the team surveyed the
area of a proposed land reclamation site
and breakwater construction for a ma-
rina around Manoel Island, Malta. They
used a high-resolution sub-bottom pro-
filer coupled with a state of the art dig-
ital data collection system on loan from
Coda Technologies, and precision GPS
from Omnistar.
The compensation INA re-
ceived from the sponsors was suffi-
cient to fund additional survey work
in Malta during 2000 (see INA Quar-
terly 26.4). In June and July, the Insti-
tute will conduct a preliminary
survey, in collaboration with the Mal-
tese Museums Department, to identi-
fy underwater sites around the three
major islands forming the Maltese Ar-
chipelago. The team will consist of Ayse
Atauz (Field Director-archaeologist),
and John McManamon (Divemaster-
archaeologist). They will be using the
Malta Maritime Authority's fourteen-
meter survey boat, Madonna Ta'Pinu, to
conduct operations throughout the ar-
chipelago.
The survey will search the sea-
bed for anomalies using side scan and
multi-beam sonars and conduct diving
inspections of underwater sites. The
number of diving locations will' vary
according to the extent of the survey
area and the magnitude of the sites. For
places of significant archaeological val-
ue, further methods such as basic map-
ping and recording of artifacts will be
carried out after consultation with the
Museums Department. The team will
raise artifacts, after consulting the De-
partment, in cases where the nature or
date of the site cannot be determined
using other methods such as photogra-
phy or underwater imaging.
The team will carry out archi-
val research and interview local fish-
ermen, recreational divers, and other
local informants on days when there
is no diving activity. In addition, they
will begin to form a database of Malt-
ese museum holdings that were recov-
ered from underwater sites.
[NA Quarterly 27.2/3
Portugal
This summer, graduate student
Filipe Castro from the Texas A&M
University Nautical Archaeology Pro-
gram will be returning to Lisbon, Por-
tugal, to finish recording the timbers of
the "Pepper Wreck" He will also con-
tinue the study of the extensive collec-
tion of artifacts found on its spice-littered
site (fig. 2). The early seventeenth-centu-
ry Portuguese Indiaman is presumed to
be the Nossa Senhora dos Mdrtires. This ship
was wrecked by a heavy storm at the
mouth of the river Tagus on September
15,1606 (see INA Quarterly 26.4). In this
2000 season, the team will be com-
posed exclusively of current and
former students from the Nautical Ar-
chaeology Program: Sara Brigadier,
Brian Jordan, Erika Laanela, Mason
Miller, and Anthony Randolph.
Albania
Elizabeth Greene, an INA Re-
search Associate and doctoral candidate
in Classics at Princeton University, will
lead a team of archaeologists to south-
em Albania in June 2000 for a coastal
reconnaissance project. In collaboration
with the Albanian Institute of Archae-
ology and the Butrint National Park
Project, the team will investigate pos-
sible wreck sites and survey target re-
gions for shipwrecks and submerged
architectural remains. The team will
work in the Butrint-Ksamil region of
Albania, the area marked for histori-
cal preservation by the Butrint Nation-
al Park. UNESCO has designated
Butrint, the site of ancient Buthrotum,
as an endangered world heritage mon-
ument. This brief reconnaissance
project marks the first season of a five-
year project of shipwreck survey and
excavation in southern Albania.
The rich cultural history and
unexplored waters of the region (see
INA Quarterly 22.2) suggest that Alba-
nia's coast may yield important new
discoveries for scholars of ancient eco-
nomics, trade, and ship construction.
Greene began planning for this survey
in 1995-96, when she spent the year
in Albania on a Fulbright grant. Polit-
ical disturbances prevented a survey
at that time, but the 2000 reconnais-
sance project marks a new beginning
for INA research in Albania.
Bulgaria
Kroum Batchvarov, in collabora-
tion with the Center of Underwater
Archaeology, Sozopol, will be excavat-
ing a shipwreck in the Bay of Kiten, near
Cape Urdoviza (see INA Quarterly 26.3).
The vessel is tentatively dated to the pe-
riod between the end of the sixteenth
and the end of seventeenth century. The
team will consist of Dr. Frederick Hock-
er, Dr. John Macmanamon, Troy
Nowak, Mark Polzer, and personnel
from the Bulgarian Center for Under-
water Archaeology.
The extensive hull remains
have much to tell us. Dendrochronol-
ogy should establish a definite date
and may even suggest an origin for the
vessel This information, in turn, may
enhance our knowledge of the mari-
time history and shipbuilding technol-
ogy of the Eastern Mediterranean and
BlackSea. It is possible the vessel could
provide new insights on previous INA
research. Specifically, it may allow
determining whether the Ottoman
wreck from Yassiada was a captured
Iberian vessel or an indigenous prod-
uct of the Empire.
Mrs. Angelova from the Center
of Underwater Archaeology will be
suppling equipment, accommoda-
tions, and the exceptional knowledge
and experience that she and her tal-
ented team possess. This will be the
first shipwreck excavated by INA in
the waters of this promising region.
Normandy
Off Omaha Beach, Normandy:
Somewhere below is the forgotten ar-
mada of D-Day-the sunken landing
craft and ships, and the men who nev-
er reached the beaches of Normandy on
June 6,1944. The men and their vessels
are remembered today by the people on
board Robo, the search boat of the Insti-
tute of Nautical Archaeology.
Robo, using side-scan sonar and
a magnetometer, is seeking the exact
locations of the landing craft and oth-
er lost ships that were destroyed as
they carried men and materiel toward
the invasion beaches.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Fig. 2. The fortress of Sao Julido da Barra, Portugal, the location of sites
SIB1 and SJB2, which will be investigated again this summer by Filipe
Castro and his team of archaeologists.
The search will produce the first
definitive map showing where the ships
and craft ended their voyage toward the
invasion beaches. Earlier, Robo, owned by
INA Director GeorgeRobb, had surveyed
Utah Beach, the other destination of the
US. invasion force. INA has designated
the search operation "Neptune 2K," after
the code name, Neptune, for the naval
aspect of Operation Overlord.
Neptune 2K isa cooperative effort
of INA, the US. Navy Historical Center,
and the National Geographic Society. Fi-
nal results of the search into the past will
be published in forthcoming issues of the
INA Qarterly and the National Geographic
Magazine.
To date, at least 10 shipwrecks re-
lated to the 0-Day invasion have been lo-
cated, some of which have never before
been seen, having spent the last five de-
cades buried in the soft mud of the seaf-
loor. Images of the wrecks and
photographs of the area can be seen on
the INA website, nautarch.tamu.edu/ina
Funding for the project was provided by
RPM Specialist Corporation, Mr. George
Robb, the Naval Historical Center, the Na-
tional Geographic Society, and the Texas
Sea Grant Program.
Civil War Blockade Runner Project
INA archaeologists will return to
Galveston, Texas, to resume work on the
wreck of the paddle steamer Denbigh, one
of the most successful blockade runners
of the American Civil War. The project,
led by INA Director of Texas Operations
Barto Arnold, identified the wreck in late
1997 (see INA Quarterly 262). Last sum-
mer (1999), Arnold and his team conduct-
ed test excavations on the wreck. Thisyear,
the team expects to complete a full round
of excavations in the areas of the cargo
hold, crew's quarters, and engine room.
The ultimate goal of the multiyearproject,
Arnold says, is eventually to recover one
of the ship's engines and paddle wheels
for exhibit in a museum. According to Ar-
nold, Denbigh marks an important mile-
stone in marine engineering. It was
constructed in 1860 at the John Laird ship-
yard in Birkenhead, near Liverpool These
shipbuilders were renowned for their de-
sign innovations, particularly in the con-
struction of iron-hulled vessels like Den-
bigh. When new, the ship was heralded as
representing "an entirely new order" of
coastal packet.
The 2000 Denbigh field crew comes
from all over the United States, with both
graduate and undergraduate students
taking part A significant proportion of the
students are from either Texas A&M Uni-
versity at College Station or Texas A&M
University at Galveston, where the field
crew is based. Denbigh Project work at
Galveston will begin on May 29 and will
continue through the end of July.
Deadman Bay Project
The Deadman Bay project will doc-
ument Wreck Baker, a frigate built dur-
ing the naval arms race that took place on
Lake Ontario during the War of 1812.
Overlooked by historic Fort Henry, King-
ston, Ontario, Deadman Bay contains the
remains of two ships that sank at their
moorings in less than seven meters of
water after the Royal Navy abandoned
them. Wreck Baker, the smaller of the two
vessels, will be studied under an Archae-
ological Permit from the Ontario Minis-
try of Citizenship, Culture, and Recreation.
Graduate students Daniel Walker, project
director and primary investigator, Amy
Borgens-Cramer, and Adam Kane will
spend three to four weeks recording the
visible remains They will provide archae-
ological data on the ship's construction
and help identify the wreck. Funding was
kindly provided by Professor Kevin
Crisman of Texas A&M University.
Guantanamo Bay
The rich history of the island na-
tion of Cuba illustrates the development
of the Americas since their discovery in
the fifteenth century. Thanks to the unique
nature of the U.S. naval base at Guantan-
amo Bay, INA has received permission to
survey the Cubanwaters encompassed by
the base. Hopefully, this will be a fust step
towards wider INA work in Cuba.
The harbor of Guantanamo Bay
has been under the control of the United
States since the Spanish-American War in
1898. As a U.S. possession, it is possible
for American citizens to operate there with
the permission of the US. military. INA
has contacted the Commanding Officer at
Guantanamo and received a permit
through his Public Works Officer. A team
consisting of INA President Jerome Hall
(principal investigator), graduate students
Mark Feulner (project director) and Will-
iam Charlton (archaeologist), and former
Navy SEAL Jonathan Gustavson (diver)
will conduct a survey of the bay in Au-
gust 2000.
Preliminary research shows that
the bay has a great deal of potential. It is
located approximately seventy miles east
of Santiago de Cuba, which was an im-
portant harbor during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. The history of the
bay portrays it alternately as a refuge for
ships plying the Windward Passage, and
as a lair for pirates who preyed on Span-
ish shipping in the region There are also
encouraging oral reports from former
Navy personnel who were stationed at the
base. They describe the locations of sever-
alwrecks within the bay, one of whichcar-
ried a cargo including clay pipes that
appear to date to the sixteenth or seven-
teenth century.
There are two primary objectives
of the survey for the 2000 season. The first
is the location and documentation of the
aforementioned "Pipe Wreck.".Reports
state that the projected location of the
wreck is easily accessible and visible from
the air on a clear day. The second goal will
be to locate a second reported wreck,
which is believed to have sunk consider-
ably later than the "Pipe Wreck" The team
hopes to gain additional information on
both sites. This will allow determining the
feasibility and value of future investiga-
tions, and aid in the development ofapres-
ervation plan. Tertiary objectives involve
the investigation of any additionaL more
modem archaeological sites that may lie
in Guantanamo Bay. The team will con-
duct interviews with local divers and na-
val personnel to gain additional
information concerning the potential for
cultural remains in other areas. If oral re-
ports reveal targets of sufficient interest,
they will also be investigated, time per-
mitting.W
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Review
by Filipe Castro
Ca Ira, Vaisseau Franeais de 80 Canons 1781-1796
by Pierre Villi6 and Martine Acerra
Stamperia Sammarcelli, Biguglia, 1998
99 pages, 7 b/w plates, 34 drawings and maps, 6 tables, bibliography,
paper cover.
This very interesting book in straightforward, uncomplicated
French presents a study of the archaeological data retrieved from the
ship-of-the-line (a Ira. The analysis is complemented by a study of some
of the most important French works on naval architecture of the eigh-
teenth century. The vessel was built at Brest in 1781 as an eighty-gun
ship and first christened Couronne. In 1791, in the heat of the French
Revolution, it was renamed La Revolution, and in 1793, after the procla-
mation of the Republic, its name changed again to Ca Ira, after the line of a revolutionary poem "Ah! Ca ira, fa ira, pa ira,
les aristocrates on les pendra" ("All the aristocrats will hang").
On the third of March, 1795, Ca Ira left Toulon in the fleet of Admiral Martin. The ships sought to land six
thousand French troops on Corsica and storm the strong British positions on the island. As the victim of unfortunate
circumstances-and Captain Horatio Nelson in H.M.S. Agamemnon-(-a Ira was lost to the British fleet of Admiral
Hotham only a few days later, during the Battle of Cape Noli. Transformed into a hospital ship and stationed in Saint-
Florent on the northern coast of Corsica, Ca Ira burned by accident in April 1796. Pierre Villi's team found it in 1989
and spent the next five years excavating the site. This book is the result of that work.
Ca Ira was excavated in the Gulf of Saint-Florent during five field seasons of four weeks each. The authors
compare construction details observed on the wreck with theories of naval architecture propounded by Blaise Ollivier
(Traitt de construction, 1736), Henri Louis Duhamel du Monceau (~inments de I'architecture naval ou pratiquede Ia con-
struction des vaisseaux, 1752), M. de Duranti de Lironcourt (Instruction imnentaire et raisonnie sur la construction pratique
des vaisseaux, en form de dictionnaire, 1771), and Vial du Clairbois (Encyclopidie mthodique de la Marine, 1783-87).
The book is divided into five chapters. The first chapter gives a cursory glimpse of the first anniversary of the
storming of the Bastille in 1789 and the general revolutionary euphoria that led to the adoption of the song (a Ira as the
name of a war vessel. The second chapter is a short but comprehensive account of the loss of the 1a Ira. The third
chapter, written by Martine Acerra, tells the story of the appearance and development of the 80-gun French ship-of-the-
line, and presents the context in which the Couronne was designed and built. In the fourth chapter, an analysis of the
archaeological data is presented. Sections of this chapter discuss the keel and false keel (p. 32), the frames (p. 40), the
keelson and maststep (p. 44), the planking (p. 48), the copper sheathing (p. 52), the drainage system (p. 54), the main
mast step (p. 67), the ballast (p. 71), the archaeological finds, including the barrels for fresh water and the ammunition
(p. 73), the kitchen (p. 78), and the marks of the British presence (p. 79). A short fifth chapter with conclusions and a
table summarizing the archaeological analysis finishes the book. There is no index.
Very easy to read and presenting good illustrations-although the captions can sometimes be mistaken as titles
and text-this book provides an interesting look at the eighteenth-century evolution of French ship design and con-
struction. I believe that it merits reading, both by scholars and avocational archaeologists.
For many reasons, Pierre Villid and his Tech Sub Association are a very good example of what an independent
non-profit organization can achieve. It has trained avocational divers to perform scientifically informed work-the
publication of the Calvi I wreck by this author in the Cahiers d'Arch~ologie Subaquatique requires mention here. The
association has performed excellent work in the study and dissemination of information concerning underwater cul-
tural heritage and deserves credit for those accomplishments. w
29 INA Quarterly 27.2/3
News & Notes
Serqe Limam pottery study and restoration
Fred van Doominck, editor of the final volume (III) of the eleventh-
century Serge Limarn Glass Wreck publication, spent the month of May in
Bodrum working with Sheila Matthews on a chapter devoted to the Islam-
ic plain wares on the ship. The study of this pottery had been well begun
in the early 1980s by then graduate student Manuela Lloyd, but much re-
mains to be done. Among the pottery groups finished in May were the five
white-ware and five red-ware gargoulettes (one-handled jugs with strain-
ers) recovered from the wreck. It was concluded that all the gargoulettes
in either group might very well have been made in the same workshop.
The white-ware gargoulettes were probably together in a single cargo pack-
age in the stem, and at least four of the red-ware gargoulettes in another
cargo package located amidships. Dr. van Doominck has recently been
informed that the white-ware gargoulettes from the Glass Wreck will be
used to date strata containing remains of similar ceramics at Fustat (Old
Cairo), the medieval capital of Egypt and the Fatimid empire.
During their work, van Doominck and Matthews encountered evi-
dence of a continuing deterioration of some Glass Wreck pottery due to
the presence of salts in their fabric, despite considerable desalinization ef-
forts over the years. The basic problem has been a woefully inadequate
supply of absolutely pure water. Particularly in view of the unusual im-
portance of the Islamic pottery from the Glass Wreck for the dating of me-
dieval Islamic sites and artifacts, it was decided that no further delay in
purchasing the equipment necessary to produce an adequate supply of Photo: INA
pure water at the conservation lab at the Bodrum castle could be justified. At the end of May, van Doorninck left the
task of installing the new equipment in the able hands of Kathy Hall and Asaf Oron.
Courtesy: Peabody Essex Museum
A&M graduate goes to Washington
Valerie Buford, an Anthropology graduate student, interned at the
Smithsonian's National Museum of American History (NMAH) from Janu-
ary 31 to May 5,2000. She worked with Dr. Paul F. Johnston, Curator of Maritime
History in theDivision of History of Technology. Buford was introduced to Johnston
by Dr. Kevin Crisman a Texas A&M professor and former NMAH intern. Since
1995, Johnston has been excavating Ha'aheo o Hawaii (Pride of Hawaii), also
known as Cleopatra's Barge (left), in Hanalei Bay, Kauai, and Buford researched
artifacts recovered during these investigations. Cleopatra's Barge, a hermaph-
rodite brig, was the first American oceangoing yacht. She was built in 1816 by
George Crowninshield, Jr. of Salem, Massachusetts, and sold to King Kame-
hameha II (Liholiho) of Hawaii in 1820. Cleopatra's Barge grounded on a reef
and sank on April 6,1824. Excavations of the wreck have increased our knowl-
edge of her Hawaiian history and ultimate fate. While little of the vessel's hull
has survived, a variety of organic and inorganic artifacts, including bone, rope,
wood, glass, ceramics, copper hull sheathing, and ballast, have been recovered.
The Texas A&M University Conservation Research Laboratory has conserved
some of the more complex finds. Interning at NMAH was an enormously edu-
cational experience. Buford utilized the vast resources of the Smithsonian's lbrar-
ies, the Library of Congress, and the National Archives. In addition, curators
and researchers within the Smithsonian and other national and international mu-
seums and institutions were very helpful, providing valuable information and
assistance. Living in Washington, D.C. among the monuments and landmarks
was also beneficial "When possible, more students should take advantage of
the wonderful opportunity to intern at the Smithsonian," Buford says.
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
Students gain ROV experience
As the world of nautical archaeology begins
to use increasingly available high-tech equipment,
the ability to operate these devices has become an
invaluable tool for the archaeologist The Nautical
Archaeology Graduate Program at Texas A&M Uni-
versity offered its first course in this arena during
the Spring 2000 Semester. The Remote Sensingclass
taught by Brett Phaneuf enabled students to attain
hands-on experience with different types of remote
sensing equipment They have studied-both prac-
tically and theoretically-the innovative technolo-
gy that is being applied to magnetometers, scanning
sonar systems, remotely operated vehicles, and sub
bottom profilers. During the semester, guest lectur-
ers from different technology providers explained
and demonstrated their operating systems. Speak-
ers included Neil Hickman from Geometrics, John The Phantom ROV provided experience in remote exploration for Texas
Pointon from OmniStar, Dirk Rosen from Deep A&M faculty and students. Photo courtesy of Deep Ocean.
Ocean, and Mark Atherton and ChuckRichards with
Kongsberg Simrad Mesotech.
In a class session geared towards assessing the feasibility of deep water excavations using Remotely Operated Vehicle
(ROV) technology, Dirk Rosen brought a Phantom XTL to TAMU for student trials. Mock targets for excavation using the Phan-
tom were placed in the wave tank at the Offshore Technology Research Center. Graduate students Aye Atauz, Sara Brigadier, Bill
Charlton, Catherine Inbody, and Mark Feulner, along with Nautical professors Kevin Crisran and Shelly Wachsmann, spent the
morning manipulating ceramic objects around the bottom of the tank with the ROV. Aside from the inherent fun of "driving" the
submersible, this type of handson experience gave students and professors insight into the mechanical workings of the ROVs, as
well as into their capabilities and limitations underwater.
Latest Bozburun Shipwreck date
Dr. Peter Kuniholm from the Malcolm and Carolyn Wiener Laboratory for Aegean and Near Eastern Deidrochro-
nology at Comell University has just confirmed he is close to isolating a date for the Bozburun Shipwreck, Turkey. By
comparing the master tree-ring sequence and a sample of wood from the vessel's hull at Bozburun, a provisional date of 874
CE has been determined. The date was established from a bark ring-the last ring Kuniholm had on the sample provided.
This is a tentative date, as it still has to be confirmed by carbon-14 dating techniques and more research with the master
sequence. The ship had already provisionally been dated to the late ninth century, based on the amphoras recovered.
Matthew Harpster, a doctoral student in the TAMU Nautical Archaeology Program, continues recording the Bozburun
hull at the INA facility in BodruA, Turkey, this summer. Harpster's studies, along with Kuniholm's tentative date and the results
of research into the ship's cargo, will lead to a greater understanding of trading practices of the late ninth century CE.
Real-World Archaeology
Since 1966, the National Historic Preservation Act has created many jobs for archaeologists, while saving thousands
of sites, buildings, shipwrecks, and neighborhoods with historic or archaeological value. A key part of the Act is Section
106, which requires consultation between all interested parties concerning any project with Federal involvement-includ-
ing expenditure of funds or issuance of a licensethat might adversely affect a historic property, including underwater
sites. To determine which projects might have such effects, Section 106 has promoted a great many archaeological surveys.
In most cases, the consultation process results in an agreement to mitigate the adverse impact, often by restoring a site,
conducting a salvage excavation, or recording a property prior to modification or destruction. Section 106 is therefore a
critical issue for today's archaeological community. Until now, most archaeologists had to learn this process on their own.
Therefore, we are glad to report the publication of Federal Planning and Historic Places: The Section 106 Process, by Thomas F.
King (Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 2000). This 195-page paperback provides an excellent overview of the relevant
issues for the archaeologist, preservationist, or agency official who must deal with the Act. w
INA Quarterly 27.2/3
INSTITUTE OF NAUTICAL ARCHAEOLOGY
George F. Bass, Co-Founder
Jack W. Kelley, Co-Founder
Jerome L. Hall, President
William L. Allen
Oguz Aydemir
John H. Baird
Joe Ballew
George F. Bass
Edward O. Boshell, Jr.,
Co-Chairman and Treasurer
Ray M. Bowen
John A. Brock
Elizabeth L. Bruni
Gregory M. Cook, Co-Chairman
Harlan Crow
William C. Culp, M.D.
OFFICERS ADMINISTRATION
Donald A. Frey, Vice President
Cemal M. Pulak, Vice President
M. Gail Vermillion, Director of
Development, INA Foundation
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Frank Darden
Thomas E Darden
John De Lapa
Claude Duthuit
Daniel Fallon
Danielle J. Peeney
Donald C. Geddes IM (Emeritus)
Woodrow Jones, Jr.
Harry C. Kahn n (Emeritus)
Michael L. Katzev
Mustafa Koc
Sally R. Lancaster
Robert E Lorton
William A. McKenzie
James A. Goold, Secretary & General Counsel
Claudia LeDoux, Assistant Secretary
& Assistant Iteasurer
Alex G. Nason
George E. Robb, Jr.
L Prancis Rooney
Lynn Baird Shaw
Ayhan Sicimolu
T. Hastings Siegfried
William T. Sturgis
Frederick H. van Doorninck, Jr.
Robert L. Walker
Lew O. Ward
Peter M. Way
Garry A. Weber
George O. Yamini
Allan Campbell, M.D.
Bill Klein, M.D.
ASSOCIATE DIRECTORS
Dana F. McGinnis
Molly Reily
Murad Sunalp, M.D.
FACULTY
George F. Bass,
George T. & Gladys H. Abell Professor of Nautical Archaeology/George 0. Yamini Pamily Professor of Liberal Arts
Kevin J. Crisman, Nautical Archaeology Faculty Fellow
Donny L. Hamilton, Frederick R Mayer Faculty Fellow
Cemal M. Pulak, Frederick R. Mayer Faculty Fellow of Nautical Arcaeology
C. Wayne Smith, Assistant Professor/Director of the Archaeological Preservation Research Laboratory
J. Richard Steffy, Sara W, & George O. Yamini Professor of Nautical Archaeology, Emeritus
Frederick H. van Doorninck, Jr., Frederick R. Mayer Professor of Nautical Archaeology, Emeritus
Shelley Wachsmann, Meadows Associate Professor of Biblical Archaeology
Cheryl Ward, Assistant Professor
J. Barto Arnold, M.A., Texas Operations
STAFF
Selma Agar
Birgil Akbiulit
Esra Altinarnt-Gdksu
Milnewer Babao k
Mustafa Babacik
Chasity Burns
William H. Charlton, Jr., M.A.
Michelle Chmelar
Mehmet Ciftlikli
Marion Feildel
Tuba EkmekQi
Adel Farouk
Jana Gober
Zafer Gill
Jane Haldane
Kathy Hall
Emad Khalil
Sheila D. Matthews, M.A.
Misti Moore
Muammer Ozdemir
Robin C. M. Piercy
Sema Pulak, M.A
Patricia M, Sibella, Ph.D.
Gillser Sinaci
AREA DIRECTORS
Douglas Haldane, MA., INA Egypt
STAFF (continued)
Murat Tdev
Sileyman Tilrel
GCnes Yapar
RESEARCH ASSOCIATES
Dan Davis
Jeremy Green
Margaret E. Leshikar-Denton, Ph.D.
Robert S. Neyland, Ph.D.
Ralph K. Pedersen, M.A
Brett A. Phaneuf
Donald Rosencrantz
ADJUNCT PROFESSORS
Arthur Cohn, J.D.
David Gibbins, Ph.D.
Faith D. Hentschel Ph.D.
Fredrik T. Hiebert, Ph.D.
Carolyn G. Koehler, Ph.D.
William M. Murray, Ph.D.
David 1. Owen, Ph.D.
Gordon P. Watts, Jr., Ph.D.
QUARTERLY EDITOR
Christine A. Powell
Tufan U. Turank, Turkish Headquarters
SUPPORTING INSTITUTIONS
Australian Institute of Maritime Archaeology
Boston University
Brown University
Bryn Mawr College
University of California, Berkeley
University of Cincinnati
Corell University
Coming Museum of Glass
Department de Arqueologia Subacuatica de
la LN.A.., 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
Texas A&M Research Foundation
Texas A&M University
University of Texas at Austin
GRADUATE FELLOWS
Mr. and Mrs. Ray H. Siegfried II
Graduate Fellow: Dan Davis
Marian M. Cook Graduate Fellow:
Sara Brigadier
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