During a 2014 expedition to the famed 2,050-year-old Roman
shipwreck off the remote island of Antikythera in Greece, underwater
archaeologists from the ‘Return to Antikythera’ project have produced a
detailed 3D map of the wreck site and uncovered a number of new
artifacts, including tableware, a giant bronze spear, and ship
components.
The Antikythera shipwreck was first discovered in October 1900 by a team of Greek sponge divers led by Captain Dimitrios Kondos.
It dates from the 1st century BC (85-50 BC) and is thought to have
been carrying looted treasures from the coast of Asia Minor to Rome, to
support a triumphal parade being planned for Julius Caesar.
The island of Antikythera stands in the middle of this major shipping
route and the ship probably sank when a violent storm smashed it
against the island’s sheer cliffs.
In 1901, the Greek divers recovered a rich collection of ancient
artifacts from the wreck site, including bronze and marble statues,
jewelry, furniture, luxury glassware, and a surprisingly complex device
known as Antikythera Mechanism.
The latter is widely considered to be one of the most important archeological artifacts ever found.
Sometimes described as the first mechanical computer, the bronze device was constructed during the period 150-100 BC.
It was originally housed in a wooden-framed case of overall size 31.5x19x10 cm and had front and back doors, with astronomical inscriptions covering much of the exterior.
Its remaining fragments contain 30 gears in a highly complex
arrangement. Technological artifacts of similar complexity did not
appear until 1,000 years later.
As most of the cargo of the wreck was from the eastern Mediterranean, archaeologists had thought that this was where the Antikythera Mechanism originated too. But a recent study
suggested that the device may have come from Syracuse in Sicily, the
Corinthian colony where Archimedes devised a planetarium in the 3rd
century BC.
For decades, archaeologists have wondered if more fragments of the
device or other ancient artifacts remain buried beneath the sea bed.
Now, the ‘Return to Antikythera’ project team has revisited the wreck site using state-of-the-art technology.
During their first season, from September 15 to October 7, 2014, the
archaeologists have created a high-resolution 3D map of the site and
recovered a series of finds.
Components of the ship, including multiple lead anchors over a
1-meter-long and a bronze rigging ring with fragments of wood still
attached, prove that much of the ship survives.
The finds are also scattered over a much larger area than the sponge divers realized, covering 300 meters of the seafloor.
This together with the huge size of the anchors and recovered hull
planks proves that the Antikythera ship was much larger than previously
thought, perhaps up to 50 meters long.
“The evidence shows this is the largest ancient shipwreck ever
discovered,” said team member Dr Brendan Foley of the Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution.
The team also recovered a beautiful intact table jug, part of an
ornate bed leg, and most impressive of all, a 2-meter-long bronze spear
buried just beneath the surface of the sand.
“Too large and heavy to have been used as a weapon, it must have
belonged to a giant statue, perhaps a warrior or the goddess Athena,” Dr
Foley said.
In 1901, four giant marble horses were discovered on the wreck by the
sponge divers, so these could have formed part of a complex of statues
involving a warrior in a chariot that was pulled by the four horses.
The team plans to return next year to excavate the site further and recover more of the ship’s precious cargo.
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