Review by Sarah Griffiths The city of Alexandria, founded by Alexander the Great (c.331 BC), was strategically situated on the Mediterranean coast at the junction of three continents, protected by reefs, headlands, and the Pharos Island to the north, and…
There are, according to the heritage body Historic England, at least 37,000 shipwrecks strewn along the country’s coastline – a legacy of more than 6,000 years of maritime trade, exploration and warfare. Such a torturous proliferation offers a poignant reminder…
In which year did Henry VIII witness the sinking of the Mary Rose?
The discovery was made by the underwater archaeology team of Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC).
A powerful iron-clad battleship, HMS Captain sank off Cape Finisterre in Spain in 1870.
We’re getting ready to hear leading experts discussing archaeology from across the UK and abroad, and we hope you can join us on 25 February (Saturday) for another stimulating and enjoyable conference. Tickets are selling fast, so book now.
Through the combined efforts of ScottishPower Renewables and Maritime Archaeology Ltd, with support from Historic England, a wrought-iron anchor, possibly dating from the Roman period, was successfully raised from the North Sea in June of last year. The location of…
With workers living on site, and indoor salt kitchens, Ta’ab Nuk Na could produce salt year-round.
A significant discovery comes in the form of the marble head of a bearded man, which researchers believe belongs to the headless Herakles in Athens' National Archaeological Museum .
Southeast Mexico is rich in caves. This extraordinary underworld has influenced human activity for thousands of years. Now a project dedicated to understanding and preserving this realm is shedding new light on the archaeology of the Yucatán Peninsula, as Guillermo de Anda told Matthew Symonds.
Due to her age and prestige, the condition of the wreck, and the accident’s political context, the discovery has been described as the most important British maritime find since that of Mary Rose in 1971.
The find has been hailed as the most significant British maritime discovery since the Mary Rose.
Located in 1985, the wreck of the Titanic lies how far below the surface of the Atlantic?
'This can be claimed as the single most significant historic maritime discovery since the raising of the Mary Rose in 1982.’
Cave diving at the cenotes in Mexico is a magical experience, a never-ending labyrinth of tunnels filled with crystal-clear water where the only limit is how much gas you can carry. With no natural light, and the crazy speleothems (mineral…
According to Plato, it was a fabulously wealthy island – larger than Asia Minor and Ancient Libya combined, and situated just beyond the Pillars of Hercules. Its powerful princes conquered much of the eastern Mediterranean, subjecting whole populations to slavery, until an alliance led by the Athenians staged a fightback, managing finally to liberate the occupied lands.
In 1958, an archaeological team set out to undertake a trailblazing survey of the submerged ruins of Apollonia. Nic Flemming looks at what was accomplished, and what changed in the decades that followed.
It is one of the oldest cogs ever found in Europe.
The finds will now be analysed, before being exhibited in the city.
Among the objects found were bronze artefacts, imported Greek ceramics, and wicker fruit baskets still containing grape seeds
The idea that there was no pre-existing Roman settlement on the site of medieval Venice is hard to credit when you realise that the Italian peninsula was heavily populated under the Roman Empire
The Phoenicians occupied the coast of the Levant for over 1,000 years, but knowledge of their trade network and practices remains elusive. In 2007, an ancient wreck containing a large cache of ceramic containers was discovered off Malta. This ship proved to be one of only a handful of known Phoenician vessels. Since 2014, further exploration of the site has yielded some very exciting results. Project Director Timmy Gambin and Lucy Woods reveal some of its mysteries, and the challenges of excavating a shipwreck 110m below sea level.
The newly discovered Ptolemaic galley was found under 5m of dense Nile clay and building remains.
Frost fitted herself out with an improvised breathing hose at a party in order to explore a 17th-century well.
A seemingly unassuming lump of corroded bronze has confounded investigators for more than a century, ever since it proved to contain precision gearwheels that simply should not have existed in the ancient Greek world. A new study, using cutting-edge techniques, has now revealed what this machine could do, and how it did it, as Tony Freeth explains.
Medieval bridge discovered in Scotland Over the last two years, the Ancrum and District Heritage Society (ADHS) have, with the help of Historic Environment Scotland, Dendrochronicle, and Wessex Archaeology, surveyed and researched a medieval wooden bridge that was discovered underwater…
Ochre mining in Mexico Evidence for the mining of red ochre has been discovered in the now-submerged caves of Quintana Roo in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. Dated to between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago, this is the earliest-known exploitation of this…
Resting in the silty mud of the Thames Estuary, the London represents a remarkable time capsule of the Stuart era – but its remains are rapidly deteriorating. Geoff Downer describes an ambitious campaign to raise and preserve the wreck before it is lost to time and tide.
Underwater archaeologists have taken to the waters of Egypt’s Aboukir Bay once more, revealing remarkable new finds from a temple at Thonis-Heracleion. Franck Goddio told Lucia Marchini about the latest results from this year’s excavation at the sunken city.
Timmy Gambin and Lucy Woods report on the discovery and exploration of HMS Olympus, which sank off the coast of Malta in 1942.
The emporium of Thonis-Heracleion lay at the westernmost entrance to the Nile. When this city sank into the Mediterranean, it created an extraordinary underwater repository of ancient activity, complete with ports and canals crammed with traces of ancient craft. Alexander Belov told Matthew Symonds what the first ship from the city to be excavated reveals about rivercraft that once caught Herodotus’ eye.
'The ship operated as a trade vessel, but was commandeered three times, before being finally ordered into service by Philip II of Spain as part of his Armada campaign.’
Following an initial season of underwater excavation in the Aegean Sea, Mantha Zarmakoupi talks to CWA about the rise and fall of the trading emporium of Delos.
For up to 4,500 years, a series of sunken dug-out canoes have been lying, forgotten, on the bottom of Lough Corrib in Co. Galway. Now these vessels are beginning to surrender their secrets once more, in an investigation by Ireland’s Underwater Archaeology Unit, spearheaded by Karl Brady.
From sea shanties to the shipping forecast, boats and the sea are woven into the fabric of English life and culture, and yet we only began to take shipwrecks seriously as historical and archaeological monuments in the 1970s. Chris Catling looks at what we have gained in the 40 years since the passing of the landmark Protection of Wrecks Act in 1973.
Once gatekeeper to Egypt’s interior, Thonis-Heracleion lay forgotten beneath the sea several miles off the Egyptian coast. The legendary city, visited by Helen of Troy as she eloped with Paris, enjoyed wealth and prestige before vanishing from the face of the earth.