While examining the Mediterranean seabed off Israel’s coast an energy company stumbled upon what has since been dubbed the world's oldest ship.
Knewz.com has learned that the wreck–which revealed itself to the sea exploration vessel through its cargo of bronze pots–is believed to be at least 3,300 years old.
According to the Israeli Antiquities Authority, the vessel, a Canaanite merchant ship, was found at a depth of 1.2 miles below the sea’s surface during a survey by the Energean natural gas company.
In an update on its official Facebook page, it noted “The contents were positively identified as Late Bronze Age Canaanite storage vessels by the Israel Antiquities Authority.”
Head of the agency’s marine division, Jacob Sharvit, elaborated: “The ship seems to have sunk in crisis, either due to a storm or to an attempted piracy attack – a well-known occurrence in the Late Bronze Age.”
“This is both the first and the oldest ship found in the Eastern Mediterranean deep sea, ninety kilometers [55 miles] from the nearest shore.”
“This is a world-class history-changing discovery: This find reveals to us as never before the ancient mariners’ navigational skills – capable of traversing the Mediterranean Sea without a line of sight to any coast.”
“From this geographical point, only the horizon is visible all around. To navigate they probably used the celestial bodies, by taking sightings and angles of the sun and star positions.”
A representative from the company that made the discovery, Energean, also weighed in on the finding.
Head of its environmental division, Dr. Karnit Bahartan, explained how they happened upon the shipwreck:
“As part of our ongoing activity to discover and extract natural gas from the deep sea, we conduct surveys that check different parameters, using an advanced submersible robot to scour the seafloor.”
While surveying the team spotted what appeared to be a large pile of jugs.
They then contacted the Israeli Antiquities Authority and sent photos of their find. “It turned out to be a sensational discovery, far beyond what we could imagine,” Dr. Bahartan recalled.
A joint operation between the two organizations ensued while Energean’s team designed and built a tool specifically for the recovery of the centuries-old artifacts.
The operation was able to produce two urns from opposite ends of the ship.
Sharvit went on to say that the items spoke to a means of “transporting relatively cheap and mass-produced products such as oil, wine and other agricultural products such as fruit” during that era.
“Finding such a great quantity of amphorae on board one single ship is testimony to significant commercial ties between their country of origin and the ancient Near Eastern lands on the Mediterranean coast.”
The find was lauded for its uniqueness and is the third of its kind with the previous two wrecks occurring close to Turkish shores.
To Israel’s Antiquity Authority, the latter proves that ships of that era were not as basic and primitive as considered in academic circles, as depicted by AncientPortsAntiques.
“The discovery of this boat now changes our entire understanding of ancient mariner abilities,” Sharvit explained.